<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>The Immortals of Schitt's Creek by middyblue (daisyblaine)</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26820427">The Immortals of Schitt's Creek</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisyblaine/pseuds/middyblue'>middyblue (daisyblaine)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Schitt's Creek</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Anal Sex, Angst, Autumn, F/F, Fluff, Found Family, Frottage, Hand Jobs, Immortality, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 10:08:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>52,799</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26820427</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisyblaine/pseuds/middyblue</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>In 1915, David and Alexis stumble into a grove of trees and become immortal, just like their new friend Stevie. In the autumn of 2015, a lonely PhD student comes to town, forcing David to reckon with how honest to be about his past and who he is.<br/>Fluff! Angst! Found family! An apple festival with an all-you-can-eat pastry contest! Welcome to autumn in Schitt's Creek.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Stevie Budd/Alexis Rose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>260</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>233</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. A Beginning</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>1) This is COMPLETE at about 50k and will be posted regularly over the next week.<br/>2) This is maybe the work that I'm proudest of and I've enjoyed living with it so much, even when I wanted to throw the whole thing away. It was supposed to be a little side-ramble while I worked out a summertime Stevie/Alexis fic which still hasn't happened.<br/>3) This was NOT inspired by the movie/books The Immortals, because I've never seen/read them.<br/>4) This happened because I read Circe by Madeline Miller (highly highly recommend) and then rewatched The Old Guard because I was still in my immortality feelings and then rewatched The Hospies because it was next in the queue and then dumped my immortal Stevie feelings all over a Google Docs page. However, only a little is borrowed from each and you don't need any familiarity with any of it.<br/>5) I feel like there's a great analogue between immortality ~philosophy and this pandemic, and I struggled with that at first. Like, when life is basically just 'same shit different day' with no end in sight, what's the point? And I feel like in canon, David might have even felt that way in his relationships pre-SC -- when every single relationship turns out to be shit, why even try? I sat with the immortality thing for a long time, trying to wrestle the darkness in it into the brighter SC tone, and eventually as I wrote it became clearer. The answer is, of course, that love and happiness are worth the wait, and powerful enough to make things better.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>ETA Please do not re-post this anywhere else, including GoodReads or Wattpad. Thanks!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Once upon a time, back when townsfolk still believed in this sort of thing, a young lady appeared in the trees outside a little hamlet in the quiet woods of what was then the British Dominion of Canada.  
</p><p>
They would say that she came over the ocean, that actually her ancestors were from here, or maybe somewhere way over there; that the apple trees bloomed more fully after she arrived, that the maple flowed thicker when she was happy.
</p><p>
She lived alone, mostly, keeping to herself, doing little magic except to ward people away from her grove deep in the woods. It was dangerous, she said kindly. She didn’t want anyone to stumble on a burden the fates had intended for her alone.
</p><p>
The town incorporated and prospered and the people grew accustomed to her presence, grateful even for something they didn’t quite understand. 
</p><p>
She would travel in the early days, but the world grew more crowded and she in turn grew more isolated, preferring to spend time on her property alone at the edge of the woods. Life went on.
</p><p>
Her peace would only be disturbed shortly, the mayor had said, when a strange family passed through town and needed to board in her house for a time. She grew attached to their son, finding him a kindred spirit, and as time passed by, she relaxed her guard.
</p><p>
The apple trees propagated and bloomed. Of course, nothing lasts forever, and that includes loneliness.
</p>
<h3>1915</h3><p>
Years later, David will remember Jocelyn talking shit about Roland’s great great great grandmother, the one who’d cursed the family against precognition, whose actual powers were in doubt. Focused on the lunch spread in front of him, David hadn’t <em>really</em> been listening.
</p><p>
He’ll remember Stevie snorting into her drink and mumbling something unkind about her Aunt Maureen before his mother changed the topic to a piece of gossip about people they used to know. 
</p><p>
They’d been in Schitt’s Creek for a year at that point, stranded in this oddly-named town in the middle of nowhere, far from any kind of civilization as they’d known it. They had only just begun to understand how blessed they were, how <em>lucky</em>, how <em>kissed by fate</em>, to have landed among Stevie and Jocelyn and Roland and Ronnie and Bob and Ray and the countless other townspeople who gave them a home even when perhaps they didn’t deserve the kindness. 
</p><p>
His father had once been a rather wealthy merchant and his mother a socialite, divinely beautiful in his memory, and they’d all come to stop in town on their way from Toronto to Montreal only to discover that their credit had been ruined by an unscrupulous relation of his father’s. And so everything had been lost, and David, naive, had felt like he’d lived an entire lifetime by then, lounging on the grass between Stevie and Alexis.
</p><p>
Someday Patrick will ask him about his life before Schitt’s Creek, in that curious historian-minded way he has that fascinates in David’s memory of the long past, but remembering back to when everything was golden and simple and easy is like peering through a sheer veil at somebody else’s life.
</p><p>
It had felt something like happiness, he’ll remember, in the way that childhood memories flash by with inconsistent detail hanging on: in smiles and bursts of laughter (at a joke? a game?) in between scraped knees (the specific tumble that gave that scar on his knee) and tears (heartbreak over a boy whose name was forgotten long ago).
</p><p>
It was what might have been the last nice day of the summer and Jocelyn had brought over some food for a picnic on the lawn of Stevie’s rundown boarding house, an unlikely home generously given. Even his mother had deigned to sit upon blankets in the grass, still dressed as if they were about to step out onto the high streets of Paris. The blankets had been soft, but he won’t be able to remember who had brought them.
</p><p>
Stevie, who so rarely smiled back then, grinned at him over something he’ll have forgotten, some private joke between them. He’ll remember that specific smile, that crinkle of her eye, the wind lifting a strand of her dark hair. Unchanging though she is, she was especially beautiful that afternoon. Even with everything to follow, he’ll remember that it had been a good day.
</p><p>
He’ll remember the humid late summer breeze blowing the wildflowers around them, the stinging smell of car exhaust drifting over from Bob’s garage, the toe of Alexis’s boot kicking at his shin as she tried to get his attention. He won’t remember exactly what he said to Alexis, or what she said to him; it will become lost, like everything, to time, to the fallibility of his memory. 
</p><p>
He thinks he remembers it like this: they were arguing about coat closet space, or whether he would escort her to the social hall later that week, or whether her hat was too far out of season, and Alexis had gotten up and stamped her foot and huffed and stalked off around the back of the boarding house. 
</p><p>
Their mother poked David’s arm and pointed after her, without even breaking her verbal stream of thought, and so obediently he followed his sister. 
</p><p>
And, like always, like <em>always</em>, he blindly followed her into whatever mess she was getting herself into. She was the younger, and he was always following her.
</p><p>
He shouted something after her as she headed towards the trees and she whipped her skirts behind herself, disappearing into the woods behind the building, and he felt some kind of irritated hesitation. 
</p><p>
At least this time there was no threat to her life from foreign dignitaries. He just had to make sure that she wouldn’t get lost or run into someone weird back there, and bring her back to their little picnic, ideally in time for some cake before the rain came. Jocelyn had made petit-fours and it had been so long since he’d had one. 
</p><p>
The wind would have picked up -- so it goes in his memory -- and perhaps that is how he lost his favorite wool hat? So, then, annoyed and chilled, he picked his way into the trees after her, careful of the brambles and spots of mud at first, and then less careful when the sound of her skirts brushing through leaves and undergrowth began to fade ahead of him.
</p><p>
He would have called after her. He would have looked back, over his shoulder, to make sure the house was still in his sight, and then to realize that it wasn’t anymore.
</p><p>
It’ll be fuzzy, whether he’d known how deep the woods went, or that it was somewhere to stay away from. The sense of foreboding might have been with him, or his memory might have added that later, but the trees were thick, and Alexis was too far ahead of him, too headstrong to listen.
</p><p>
“Alexis!” he would have yelled, over and over. He’ll dream about it, sometimes: shouting after her, following her into the dark, the trees knitting themselves tighter around him the more he shouts.
</p><p>
His sweater would have gotten caught in the trees, like they were clawing him back. He would’ve cursed at the pulled threads, at the mud on his shoes, at his missing hat (if indeed it had blown away). 
</p><p>
It could have been minutes or an hour that he spent dodging branches, straining for the sound of his sister. 
</p><p>
He’ll remember finding her abruptly in a small clearing, a miraculous beam of sunlight shining down upon her through the trees, and she glowed, her sunlit gown a beacon, and the relief nearly made him drop to his knees.
</p><p>
She stood there and looked back at him for a second, as if she didn’t recognize him, before her eyes widened in fear.
</p><p>
“Don’t, David!” she shrieked and, fool as he was, he stepped forward to make sure that she was alright, and then:
</p><p>
A bright light overtaking him, a strange nothingness, and he was flat on his back in the middle of the clearing, Alexis kneeling over him. The beam of sunlight was gone; the temperature was dropping with the coming rain, and he could feel a drop or two fall on his skin, but he wasn’t cold.
</p><p>
“David,” she urged. “David, are you okay?” Her eggshell-white dress had bits of loam stuck to it.
</p><p>
He groaned and pushed himself to sit, the seat of his pants dampening unpleasantly on the dewy grass.
</p><p>
“What the fuck,” he said under his breath. She wrapped an arm around his shoulders.
</p><p>
“Okay, lady here,” she said, as if she didn’t curse just as often, “and <em>I know</em>.”
</p><p>
“What was that?”
</p><p>
“Colm told me about these,” she said. “I think it’s some kind of magic ring.” He’ll only ever remember that Colm, an otherwise unremarkable arrogant beau of hers from years before they found their way to Schitt’s Creek, had existed because of this moment. Colm, a bland man who would otherwise be lost to history, kept alive for decades in David’s memory for something he once said to a lady he’d hoped to take to bed. The books of time can be strange and looping. 
</p><p>
She gestured at the aged trees ringing the clearing, the pale undersides of their leaves flickering in the wind, trunks spaced evenly in a circle around them. He won’t be sure if he’d noticed them before she pointed them out, but probably not, intent as he was at getting her and getting out of the woods. 
</p><p>
“Okay, what do we do?”
</p><p>
Without answering, she helped him up and then walked to the edge of the clearing, hesitating barely a moment before stepping through the ring of trees and back into the woods. Nothing happened -- although, of course, everything that would happen already had.
</p><p>
She looked back over her shoulder at him and shrugged. Yet another scrape that fate just let her slip through, it had seemed at the time.
</p><p>
“Maybe it’s just a weird little thing. Come on, David,” she said, and he hurried to catch up to her.
</p><p>
They’d heard their family and friends shouting for them before they saw the boarding house through the trees. Maybe Stevie’s voice sounded more panicked than the others; maybe his memory rewrote it that way. 
</p><p>
He’d asked Stevie once, years later, what it had been like for her to go through the ring. She’d told him that it didn’t work for her like that; that it was in her blood, her aunt’s curse, and the trees were only a manifestation of it. 
</p><p>
David would wonder if all curses seemed so easily done, like stepping through a spider’s web.
</p><p>
He and Alexis left the woods and rejoined the party and he probably asked whether there was any cake left and Alexis probably brushed off her dress and dropped back down on the blankets as if nothing had happened. 
</p><p>
It had rained that afternoon, though, he’ll remember, and wonder at what point the rain started. Maybe Alexis hadn’t sat down; maybe she’d gone inside, leaving him to clean up the picnic. 
</p><p>
Maybe nobody but Stevie was waiting for them at the trees’ edge.
</p><p>
He’ll remember this, though: helping Stevie gather the blankets and dishes in the thickening rain, his hand had brushed Stevie’s, and she’d glanced at him, shocked, and whispered, “Oh, fuck.” And memory will tell him, true or not, that that’s when he knew that fate hadn’t let them go so easily. 
</p><p>
Somehow she’d herded him and Alexis into the parlor and shut the door, which didn’t help his anxiety. 
</p><p>
In the years since then the boarding house has changed a little with the times: it’s now an inn, the parlor now the lobby, the wallpaper redone, the handcrafted sofas swapped out for factory-made clearance lumpy things. But the image of how it was that day is seared in his mind. The wallpaper had been pink and purple flowers; the lounge furniture had been walnut with a vomitous pink floral upholstery. 
</p><p>
For some reason, instead of looking at Stevie, he’d focused his gaze on a hand-carved wooden mallard perched on the mantelpiece as she talked.
</p><p>
Alexis had laughed disbelievingly when Stevie told them that the ring wasn’t meant for humans; that they should have been deterred by the spells she’d put up around it; that she was sorry for it. 
</p><p>
“And what is it that’s happening, exactly?” David had asked. He sat closest to the fire, but he wasn’t warmed by it.
</p><p>
“Immortality,” Stevie had said flatly, her pale face glowing in the firelight. 
</p><p>
The mallard stared unblinkingly back at him from its place on the mantle.	
</p><p>
They’d argued with her, probably, but it had been hard to argue when their parents aged and they did not. When their parents died and David’s face was still unwrinkled. When Alexis got tuberculosis and recovered overnight. When the world went on around them and they were still there in Schitt’s Creek, a stay changed from overnight to over a year to truly unending. 
</p><p>
It might not have happened exactly like that, but that’s how he’ll remember it. 
</p><p>
A hundred years is a long time to hold a memory in your hands, eager as it is to slip through your fingers, the sands of time falling, like everything does. 
</p>
<h3>2015</h3><p>
Because Stevie is a cruel friend, she doesn’t let David have his own floor of the inn. He and Alexis have to share the top floor, which means sharing a bathroom, although they do have separate bedrooms. This means that when he wakes up bleary-eyed from staying up late with a bottle of wine the night before, and stumbles to the bathroom, he bangs on the closed door and shouts, “Get the fuck out, Alexis! You forfeited the right to first shower when you <em>murdered</em> my tamagotchis!” 
</p><p>
“Um. Occupied?” someone who is <em>not</em> Alexis says from within, and adrenaline shocks David awake. 
</p><p>
He takes a few steps backwards to check the number on the room door by the bathroom: 4C, so he didn’t somehow wake up on the wrong floor. He has 4A and Alexis has 4B and 4C is supposed to be empty to store their overflow wardrobes. There should be no one else on this floor. It’s <em>supposed to be empty</em>. He jiggles the handle to 4C, and the lock holds, and he has to bite back a shriek. 
</p><p>
He stomps down the hallway that he’d been roped into helping recarpet back in the ‘90s, down the stairs, and into the lobby, ignoring the stares of random guests as he goes. 
</p><p>
He raps his knuckles against the top of the oak desk to get Stevie’s attention.
</p><p>
“Um. Hi,” Stevie says, blinking at him from behind the computer. 
</p><p>
“Did you put someone in 4C?” he demands. She cringes.
</p><p>
“You know we’re full up for the AppleFest this weekend,” she says, vaguely apologetically. “Someone needed a room and we’d accidentally double-booked.”
</p><p>
“What about my clothes?!”
</p><p>
“They are safely in the back room. I also hired a few bodyguards, you know, just to make sure.”
</p><p>
“Wha-”
</p><p>
“I’m kidding, David. Breathe. Your clothes are fine. You’re lucky I didn’t have to make you move back into Alexis’s room with her to free up your room for the extra money.”
</p><p>
“Ew. Why didn’t you tell me you were putting someone in there? Did you store my knits properly?”
</p><p>
“I think that after an eternity stuck with you I know how to store your knits.”
</p><p>
“Okay, that was rude. I will remind you that it’s only been a hundred years, and you should be grateful for my company.” She rolls her eyes. “Who is this person, anyway?”
</p><p>
“He’s a graduate student from Montreal working on a paper or something. Chill out. He seems like a nice, quiet guy, and he’ll be gone soon enough.”
</p><p>
David eyes her.
</p><p>
“What is that supposed to mean?”
</p><p>
“Just. You know.” She shrugs and moves a string of cards in her freecell game on the janky computer. Surprisingly, she’s probably the one who took to computers the best of all of them; Alexis has a deft handle on social media, and David just kind of… deals. But while she knows how they work, all Stevie does with it is manage the booking system and play fucking freecell. 
</p><p>
“Just wait a while.” He supposes that she’s probably lived through quite a few technological revolutions, and more likely than not there’s another change coming to adapt to. “We have time, and he’ll move on.”
</p><p>
“In how many days?!”
</p><p>
“I don’t know. He didn’t give me a checkout date. But he’s, you know, a normal human person. So eventually he’ll leave.”
</p><p>
“Jesus Christ, that’s dark for this early in the morning.”
</p><p>
She shrugs again and he flexes his hands at his sides, swallowing. There’s nothing he can say, really, because she’s not wrong. 
</p><p>
It’s just that, in the early days, after she’d gotten over the guilt of inadvertently putting him and Alexis through this, they’d had some fun. The three of them had gone to Montreal and partied all night; they’d rowed out into the middle of Lake Champlain and stared up at the crisp constellations and Stevie had told them increasingly elaborate stories about the old gods, the ones she said she was distantly related to, the ones who’d cast her bloodline down to Earth, cursed with living among mortals without being allowed to actually <em>be</em> one.
</p><p>
But it’s been a very long time since this was new to any of them. They’ve all gotten close with people, only to have to step back and leave before they were found out to not be normal, or been left once they’d revealed it. As far as he knows, nothing new has happened to make her especially nihilistic.
</p><p>
Anyway. Usually she gives him a heads-up before she does anything with the wardrobe that he’s literally spent decades curating.
</p><p>
“Stop by the store later, okay?” he tells her before he heads back upstairs. “I have major gossip.” 
</p><p>
She ignores him, but he knows she heard him. He gives quick polite smiles to the tourists he passes on the grand staircase, pretending that he’s not essentially wearing pajamas in public. They’re knee-length lounge pants and a tee-shirt, but still, he’s never really settled into wearing super casual clothes in public where other people can see him. 
</p><p>
And he hopes the guy in 4C is out of the bathroom, because he really has to pee.
</p><p>
Unfortunately, his lot is not so lucky today. He gets upstairs just in time for a half-naked god of a man to step out of the bathroom, a grey inn towel wrapped around his waist and his hair still wet, and David flicks an uncertain smile at him as he passes in the hallway.
</p><p>
“Sorry,” the guy says, his voice warm amber with eyes to match. A drop of water slips from his collarbone and David forces himself not to track it down his bare chest. “The bathroom’s all yours.”
</p><p>
“Thanks,” David thinks he says, and shuts the door behind himself. <em>Oof</em>. 
</p><p>
The bathroom is still humid and steamy; there’s not even a hand-wiped clear spot on the mirror where the guy might have checked his face before walking out. How strange, that a man so handsome would not be even a little vain.
</p><p>
Speaking of which: it’s entirely possible that Jake is still in David’s room. He’d had to shove Jake’s arm off him in order to get out of bed, but that doesn’t mean much for a guy whose idea of getting ready for the day is to pull on whatever clothes are nearby and walk right out the door. Jake does like to just leave whenever and generally operates on his own time. Which is fine.
</p><p>
It’s a nice arrangement they have, in that Jake literally does not care about offending him or being polite or really anything, and they could probably sleep together for thirty years and Jake still wouldn’t care that David doesn’t seem to age. He hooked up with him a few months ago at the town’s only bar, the Wobbly Elm, and ever since then they get together probably about every other week. They don’t really <em>talk</em> much, but it’s fine.
</p><p>
It’s really good, casual sex, and it almost doesn’t matter that they’re not exclusive. He stopped really dating people back in the fifties, with a brief foray in the eighties that’s really best not to be remembered. And Jake is the perfect guy to not-date, because he literally doesn’t care.
</p><p>
David just really wants his morning shower before going to open the store. 
</p><p>
He shoves open the sash of the bathroom window -- they’d last replaced it a long time ago; it’s probably due for another replacement, maybe with, like, heat-containing powers, or something -- and turns the shower on, barely registering the creak of the hot water pipes. 
</p><p>
His body is exactly the same as it had been the day he’d followed Alexis into the woods. The same stretch marks on his hips, the same patterns of freckles on his shoulders, the same muscle tone exactly. He’d broken his leg falling off the roof when he’d been roped into helping clean out the inn’s gutters for Stevie about fifty years ago. The bone had stuck out through the skin, it was <em>disgusting</em>, and it had healed overnight. Small injuries heal more quickly, big injuries heal more slowly, but all of it fades with no mark to remember it by. Alexis had dated a guy with the same injury about thirty years later, and he’d had this massive scar and pin-prick scars of stitch marks bordering it.
</p><p>
David watches the water run through his leg hair, the skin smooth as it was a hundred years ago. Sometimes that’s what it feels like: time is just running by him, running over him, running through him.
</p><p>
He dips his head under the water and closes his eyes, letting it wash over his face. He remembers when the inn only had baths, and then after that when the water ran cold quickly before Stevie was able to put in a big hot water tank. He wonders if Stevie remembers days before indoor plumbing, and shudders. 
</p><p>
He blinks his eyes open to reach for the body wash and his gaze catches on a white bar of soap with a little bird on it that hadn’t been there before. He and Alexis generally have free reign over the whole floor and are very familiar with the sight of each other’s toiletries in the shared bathroom, so something new is… noticeable. 
</p><p>
He pokes at it with his forefinger, and the surface is slimy like it’s just been used. He gingerly sniffs at it: generic soap, probably drying, probably no oils in it at all. He makes a face and leaves it, reaching for the eucalyptus body wash from one of his vendors. If he were a better person, he would throw out the bar of soap and tell the guy to just use the Apothecary body wash, to save his skin, but he’s learned to just let these things pass him by. He tries, at least; he hasn’t quite mastered the laissez-faire attitude that Alexis carries with her.
</p><p>
Alexis has told him she doesn’t understand why he gets up as early as he does. She sleeps as late as she likes, and takes only the jobs that interest her, and lives life entirely on her terms. 
</p><p>
He sleeps as late as he can justify, and gets up, and goes to work, and opens his store on time so that people in this town know that they can count on him. So that they have no reason to doubt him. He has to create a good product, a good image, every single day, so that in case of the worst happening, the town won’t turn on them.
</p><p>
He carefully shapes his hair and dresses and heads to the store in time to open it according to the sign on the door. He stops by the cafe first for a coffee, not because it’s especially good coffee but because he likes the routine. He likes that Twyla has his macchiato waiting for him with a smile, and that on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays he can get a fresh cinnamon roll from Ivan.
</p><p>
“Hi, Twyla,” he says with a brief smile. She beams at him and hands him his to-go cup and a pastry bag.
</p><p>
“Happy Friday!” she says cheerily. He turns to go but pauses.
</p><p>
“Hey, Twy?”
</p><p>
“Yeah?”
</p><p>
“Have you met the guy who’s staying at the inn?”
</p><p>
“Which one?”
</p><p>
“He’s a… student. Or something.” He brushes his hand through the air, trying to affect nonchalance. It doesn’t really matter, though; Twyla has to be the least suspicious person he’s ever met.
</p><p>
“Oh! Yes. He sat over there for dinner last night. I think he ordered the chicken parm. Is he a friend of yours?”
</p><p>
“Um. No. I sort of met him this morning and I just… wondered.”
</p><p>
Twyla stops moving around behind the counter and gives him a sly grin.<em> Damn it</em>.
</p><p>
“Never mind,” he says quickly.
</p><p>
She taps the side of her nose with a wink and says, “I won’t tell. He is pretty cute, though. Good for you. And hey, if you see Alexis, tell her that today’s smoothie is apples and pears.”
</p><p>
“Will do,” he promises, and makes his exit when Emir nudges his way forward to place an order.
</p><p>
Stevie wanders into the store mid-morning, clutching a coffee from the cafe. 
</p><p>
“Don’t you have people to check in?” he asks, making a tick mark next to the body milks on his inventory list as he finishes counting them off.
</p><p>
“Not till later. I always forget how much work the festival weekend is,” she says tiredly. 
</p><p>
“Sounds like you had a busy night.”
</p><p>
“Busy morning, actually,” she says, grinning over her coffee.
</p><p>
“Oh?”
</p><p>
“Do you remember Jake? Tall, woodworker, kind of a himbo?”
</p><p>
“Uh, yeah.”
</p><p>
“We had a good time after I saw you this morning,” she says, a blissed-out smile crossing her face. <em>Unbelievable</em>.
</p><p>
“Um. We had a good time <em>last night</em>. That was my gossip.”
</p><p>
“No…”
</p><p>
“Yes.”
</p><p>
“No!”
</p><p>
“Yes!”
</p><p>
“Goddamn it. I knew he was sleeping with other people, but I thought he had better taste.” He makes a face at her and she laughs. 
</p><p>
“So do you want this one?” he asks. He wouldn’t mind, really, and they both know they’re too competitive to share.
</p><p>
“I mean, he’s a good lay.”
</p><p>
“Fine, whatever.”
</p><p>
“You know it can never be more than that, right?” she asks carefully, sipping her coffee. He knows, and he knows she knows he knows. For however long a century feels to him, she’s been immortal among mortals for longer. He asked her, once, how old she was. <em>Old</em>, she’d said. <em>I don’t remember anymore</em>. At first, he’d liked to read parts of the Iliad aloud and ask her which Greeks she’d slept with.
</p><p>
“I know.” The jokes got old.
</p><p>
“No matter what.” Sometimes, when he looks at her, he sees the full weight of her years on her face. Not in wrinkles, but in exhaustion that no coffee can lift.
</p><p>
“I know.” Alexis had had more luck in asking Stevie about past relationships: <em>They leave</em>, was the gist of it. <em>Every time</em>, she’d said, staring up at the stars. <em>However it happens, they will always leave</em>.
</p><p>
“You’re sure you don’t need it? Last week you told me you were so horny you wouldn’t say no to Sebastien, and he died eighty years ago.”
</p><p>
“Excusez-moi. I was <em>high </em>and simply forgot what year it was. And I can get it whenever I want.” So maybe Jake’s the only person he’s slept with in… a while. Stevie doesn’t need to know that. He’s perfectly capable of finding a hookup if he wants one, and of keeping from getting attached.
</p><p>
“Sure,” she says skeptically. “Okay. Fine.”
</p><p>
“Fine.”
</p><p>
“Great.”
</p><p>
“Great!”
</p><p>
“Uh, hello?” 
</p><p>
David and Stevie whip around to see who’s walked in on their bickering, and to his surprise, it’s the guy from 4C. 
</p><p>
“Hi,” David says breathily, fully ignoring Stevie’s arched eyebrow. It’s been a long time since he’s seen that particular expression from her and he hasn’t missed it. He flips her off behind his back, where the guy can’t see.
</p><p>
“Hi, I’m Patrick Brewer. I think we met earlier? I’m, uh, sorry to hear about your tamagotchis,” he says, a smile pulling at his mouth. David crooks his jaw and feels himself flush. “I’m a PhD student at McGill working on a thesis about the intersection of community-based economic structures and quality of life. Which is what I’m doing here. I was told to talk to the manager of the general store.” 
</p><p>
Patrick Brewer is wearing basic jeans and a blue button-down and his hair is now dry and his eyes are still round and warm and focused on David and Stevie needs to go away now please. 
</p><p>
“Well. Anything for, um. Education.” Stevie chokes on her coffee and David ignores her.
</p><p>
“That’s great,” Patrick says, amused. “So you’re the business manager?”
</p><p>
“David Rose,” David says automatically, reaching out to shake Patrick’s hand. Patrick’s handshake is firm and practiced and David feels drawn, somehow, to his smile. 
</p><p>
“It’s nice to meet you,” Patrick says, his mouth still quirked to one side like he’s finding something funny. “So do you mind if I ask you about your business model? All Mutt told me was that this is the general store for the town.”
</p><p>
“You talked to Mutt,” David reiterates, eyebrows raised. Mutt is, at least, somewhat more level-headed than Roland had been; unfortunately, he really doesn’t care much about the town, or even about the fact that David, Alexis, and Stevie all knew his great-grandfather. David suspects that he’s filed it all in the same bin as the mayorship: just one more thing about the town that he essentially inherited and can’t wait to get away from. Well, David can relate.
</p><p>
“I did,” Patrick says. “The mayor is generally one of the key stakeholders in this kind of research.” The sunlight coming through the front windows tints his hair golden.
</p><p>
“Stevie Budd,” Stevie interrupts. Patrick politely shakes her hand. “I run the inn.”
</p><p>
“Right! Of course. Thanks again for finding me a room so last-minute.”
</p><p>
“Oh, it was my pleasure,” she says, and David knows that she means it only in the sense that she will be gleefully torturing David about this for as long as Patrick is in town. Not that it will matter: chances are that Patrick is just passing through, and will be gone by next week, a blink in time. “Let me know if I can help answer any questions. I’ve got to get back, David,” she adds. “I have my phone.” She waves it above her shoulder and he nods. They might not have had cell phones for the majority of their friendship, but the message isn’t new: <em>let me know if this guy is being sketchy</em>.
</p><p>
“So,” David says when they’re alone in the store. “You’re not here for the AppleFest?”
</p><p>
“Well, yes and no,” Patrick says, waggling a hand. He’s holding an honest-to-god clipboard in the other, with a pen clipped to a little memo pad in his shirt pocket. It would be horrifying on anyone else, but Patrick’s sleeves are neatly rolled up and his forearms are really carrying the aesthetic for David. Like, <em>really</em>. 
</p><p>
He wonders if Patrick has any blazers with elbow patches and then immediately has to put a stop to that train of thought and yank his attention back to what Patrick’s saying. 
</p><p>
“I’ve got some data about the importance of civic engagement interacting with the economy in promoting quality of life in small towns versus cities. But my supervisor feels like there’s more to it than just the quant analysis -- you know, the numbers. So what I’m hoping to get here is some qualitative data: you know, talk to people at the festival, get a sense of how they feel about it. What draws them here, what keeps them here, how they invest in the community, what they get out of it, that kind of thing.”
</p><p>
“Oh, sure,” David says, totally lost.
</p><p>
“And, to be honest, I had some free time come up unexpectedly, and I found the AppleFest on Google. It kind of seemed like fate.”
</p><p>
“Uh huh.” David flexes his hands, searches for something to say that’s not <em>you have really nice shoulders, did you know?</em> “You said you wanted to ask me about my store?” 
</p><p>
“Yeah, I just wanted to get a sense of the economic history here.” Patrick flips a few pages on his clipboard and scans through a list written carefully there. “According to province records, the Apothecary was founded around 1916. Is that right?”
</p><p>
“Yes.”
</p><p>
“By a ‘Jonathan Rose.’ Any relation?”
</p><p>
“Yes.”
</p><p>
Patrick seems to wait for David to elaborate. He focuses on straightening the foot creams on the table in front of him instead, making sure they’re all facing forward and evenly spaced.
</p><p>
“Okay,” Patrick says after a moment. “According to my notes here, it looks like the town was incorporated in 1895 with Roland Schitt as the mayor. So the store’s been here almost as long as the town itself.”
</p><p>
“It has.”
</p><p>
“Awesome. Has the general store always been in this building?”
</p><p>
“Yes, actually. There’s a time capsule in the wall just over there,” David adds, gesturing toward the back wall, the words spilling out as he remembers. God, he’d forgotten entirely. 
</p><p>
His dad had insisted; some kind of builders’ tradition, a good luck charm, he’d said. He remembers how his dad had been so proud that they could open the store together, after everything had fallen apart for their family. Missing his parents doesn’t come too often anymore, but when it does, it’s a physical ache behind his heart. It’s one thing that cannot be cured by immortality, only exacerbated by it.
</p><p>
“Wow,” Patrick says, watching David’s face. David clears his throat. “And then when Jonathan Rose died in 1930, a David Rose took ownership. I guess that would be your namesake, huh?”
</p><p>
“Um. Yes.”
</p><p>
“And then in the ‘90s the town took over the business?”
</p><p>
“Yes,” David says, his voice embarrassingly hoarse; he clears his throat again. “The town technically owns both the Apothecary and the Rosebud Inn.”
</p><p>
“That’s so interesting.”
</p><p>
“Is it?”
</p><p>
“It is,” Patrick says, but doesn’t elaborate as he writes his little notes. 
</p><p>
David shifts his shoulders uncertainly. It had gotten tricky when ownership documents were starting to become digitized, and at the time transferring ownership to the town had seemed like the best move long-term to avoid questions, like why a David Rose who was born in the 1880s still owned the store a hundred years or more later. Generally their rule of thumb is to not tell people what they are unnecessarily; the town is perennially good to them, but none of them wants to invite trouble. He stays silent.
</p><p>
“And can you tell me a little about the store?”
</p><p>
“Well, it’s a general store,” David says, and cringes inwardly. “I mean. As you can see, it’s a very specific store.” Patrick’s mouth quirks in a smile and David looks around at his sand and stone decor, the neatly ordered products, the potted plants by the windows, the stained glass art that had been in the inn’s windows back in the ‘30s hanging on the back wall. “I have a very specific vision?”
</p><p>
“I can see that,” Patrick says, deadpan. David curls his lip and Patrick laughs softly. 
</p><p>
“Anyway, I can stock pretty much anything people in town need, and I have ongoing agreements with local vendors to stock their products via consignment under the umbrella label of the store.”
</p><p>
“That’s great,” Patrick says, actually sounding impressed. He picks up a bottle of body milk and examines the Rose Apothecary label. He puts it back where it was, which is nice.
</p><p>
“Thanks.”
</p><p>
“And, hey,” Patrick says, flipping his pen, “is there anything you like to do in town? For fun, I mean.”
</p><p>
“What, me?”
</p><p>
“Yeah, I mean, you specifically or people in town in general,” Patrick says hurriedly, shoving his hands into his pockets. “For research purposes.”
</p><p>
“Well, for research purposes, we have the one bar, if you don’t mind your shoes sticking to the floor and knock-off brand booze. But to actually enjoy yourself this weekend you’ll want to hang around town.”
</p><p>
“For the AppleFest? How so?” Patrick asks, leaning back on the cash counter and putting his pen to the clipboard in one smooth movement.
</p><p>
“Oh, you don’t -- don’t write this down,” David says, flustered. “I just meant that, if all else fails, you’ll get to eat a lot of apple cider donuts.”
</p><p>
Patrick laughs and David feels the corners of his mouth twitch in a smile.
</p><p>
“Well, according to this brochure,” Patrick says, unclipping from his nerdy little clipboard a copy of Alexis’s AppleFest brochure that he must have picked up at the inn, “the festival starts later today with a bonfire.”
</p><p>
“Mm, yes. We get together to appease the old gods with some smoke inhalation for everybody.”
</p><p>
“Traditions are good. Do you get to eat s’mores?” Patrick asks, tilting his head. David concedes with a nod. “Well, then it sounds like a good time.”
</p><p>
“Oh, that part is,” David says, pressing back a smile. It’s stupid because they do have to go to the thing every year, and every year it’s basically the same order of operations: bonfire on Friday, eat a ton of apple pastry on Saturday, town dance on Sunday. It’s been the same ever since Roland founded the town in 1895, according to Stevie, and although she complains right along with David, as far as he knows she’s never missed one. Two years ago they’d gotten so drunk on Fireball that they’d even joined in the dancing, to Alexis’s delight.
</p><p>
“Do you want to, um. Head over there together, later?” Patrick asks. Lost in his own head, David almost misses the way he seems to have to steel himself to meet David’s eyes to ask. “It’s just that I don’t know anyone, and it would be good to have someone to talk to and help me get the lay of the land.”
</p><p>
“Oh, so you’re just using me for my connections,” David teases. Patrick cracks a grin.
</p><p>
“Well, of course.”
</p><p>
“I suppose I could help you out.”
</p><p>
“Then it’s a date,” Patrick says, and taps his pen on the counter. 
</p><p>
David feels himself flush, which is dumb on all sorts of levels, but there it is.
</p><p>
“I have to go get some work done, but I’ll come stop by later so we can head to the bonfire,” Patrick says, and David nods helplessly. “Cool. It was good to meet you, David Rose.” David nods again and Patrick gives a little laugh before heading out. 
</p><p>
<em>Fuck</em>. 
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. AppleFest!: The Bonfire</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>A playlist for your listening needs on spotify <a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7xM34TNyD7AP2u2f1qRDms?si=qH4KxpytTsSaCEsPTTDz2Q">here</a>!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Patrick shows up again as David is sweeping the floors. David had almost convinced himself that Patrick wouldn’t come, yet here he is, looking cute as hell in a shearling-lined denim jacket, a navy toque stuffed in one pocket and his little notebook and pen in the other.
</p><p>
“Well, don’t you look nice,” David says, pulling his mouth to one side in a half-smile. Patrick laughs and blushes a little and David has to hold onto the broom handle to keep upright.
</p><p>
“Thanks. Ready to go? I’ve been looking forward to these s’mores all day.”
</p><p>
“Understandable,” he says, and Patrick laughs again.
</p><p>
David puts the broom away, double-checks that the till is locked, and grabs his own wool coat from its hook behind the counter. It unnerves him a little that Patrick actually showed up when he said he would -- who does that? -- but he thinks he hides it pretty well by the time his coat is on. 
</p><p>
Summer in Schitt’s Creek always seems to last forever, until one week in September when the first autumn breezes blow through, and from there the trees start turning riotous red and yellow. 
</p><p>
Some years the bonfire feels like a summer night, but most years the temperature drops rapidly after the sun sets, and David gets to debut his new favorite coat. It’s been sunny all day, though, so he’s surprised when they step outside and it’s already getting chilly. He does up the buttons of his wool coat and smiles to himself at how well it fits.
</p><p>
“So you go to this bonfire every year, huh?” Patrick says, tilting his face up to squint at the setting sun.
</p><p>
“Mm.” 
</p><p>
“Yeah, you seem like someone who’s right at home outdoors,” Patrick teases. From anyone else David would bristle, but Patrick smiles fondly and his eyes crinkle up and David blushes instead.
</p><p>
“Okay, so maybe the marshmallows are the big draw,” David admits, waving his hand in acquiescence. “I will not feel shame about it.” Patrick laughs and David crooks a smile.
</p><p>
“Has it ever rained?”
</p><p>
“Of course. After the first few times, the town wised up and bought some tents, although it’s a bit less exciting to be packed in under a tent staring at the bonfire as it dies.”
</p><p>
“Well, we’ve got some great sun today,” Patrick says, looking perfectly content to just be walking through town with David under the clear blue sky, admiring the yellow-gold leaves on the trees that line the street.
</p><p>
The bonfire is traditionally held in the field out by Mutt’s barn, and as they head over it seems like almost everyone in town is walking over too, the crowd growing thicker as they get closer. They pass the town hall and David hears Alexis calling his name; he tries to keep walking but she bounds down the steps of the hall and skips up to them, hooking her arm through David’s.
</p><p>
“David!” she chirps. “Who’s this?”
</p><p>
“This is Patrick.” 
</p><p>
“I’m Patrick,” Patrick repeats, giving her a little wave. She coos and David wishes he could sink through the sidewalk. 
</p><p>
“Aren’t you a cutie,” she says, crinkling up her nose. “I am the PR and event coordinator for the town and also David’s charming and lovely younger sister, Alexis.” David scowls at her and she beams. 
</p><p>
“Oh, the one who killed your tamagotchis?” Patrick asks curiously.
</p><p>
“Ugh, David, are you still telling people that story?”
</p><p>
“They were in the <em>prime of health</em>!”
</p><p>
“Whatever. It’s nice to meet you, Patrick. Sorry about my brother in advance. You can hang out with me and Stevie if he loses his mind about a bug on his coat or something.”
</p><p>
“Oh, my god,” David says, mortified. She bops his nose.
</p><p>
“Oh, David, I made sure they brought enough cider this year. Remember when they ran out before Mutt could even get the thing lit? Nightmare.”
</p><p>
“How is Mutt doing?” David asks, grabbing onto the change of subject. “Has he actually written a speech this time?”
</p><p>
She rolls her eyes and shakes her head.
</p><p>
“You know him. He’d rather be out picking pinecones or something. I offered to write it for him but he had me on site for most of the day overseeing the guys setting it up, so I just jotted down some cue cards.”
</p><p>
“Mutt, the mayor?” Patrick asks.
</p><p>
“And her <em>boyfriend</em>,” David says, dragging out the word in a pretty good facsimile of her whine. She hits his shoulder with the back of her hand. 
</p><p>
“You deserve better than him, Alexis,” he says, not for the first time.
</p><p>
“Hush, David.”
</p><p>
In the open field there’s an old wooden stage erected for the mayor to stand on and give a speech, and a row of picnic tables with huge plastic jugs for water and cider and plates of potluck food. Several yards in front of the stage, well away from the barn, is where the bonfire will be lit to celebrate the start of the harvest season and, nominally, the AppleFest.
</p><p>
The crowds are already milling around the pile of wood pallets under the deepening sky, waiting for the bonfire to be lit. In the old days, Roland would make a big show of throwing a lit match onto the stack of wood, often over his shoulder with his back turned. It would take a half the matchbox and someone had to stand by with a bucket of water for when a patch of grass inevitably caught fire instead. The whole town would be yelling at him to just do it properly, but he’d just yell right back and keep going his way until it finally lit, and that chaos was just as much a part of the tradition as anything else.
</p><p>
Nowadays, Mutt usually says a few words, holds a lighter to one of the pallets, and walks away. There’s not a whole lot positive David can readily say about Roland, but if he’s honest, he does miss the sense of drama. 
</p><p>
Alexis drags them over to the line of picnic tables to get drinks, her innate charisma somehow letting them work to the front of the line more quickly than David would manage alone. 
</p><p>
To his pleasant surprise, Patrick pours hot mulled cider into one of the paper cups, hands it to David, and then does the same and hands one to Alexis before taking one for himself. 
</p><p>
Alexis turns to David and mouths, <em>Nice one</em>, and he makes a face at her really quickly before Patrick can see. But she just smiles at him, the crinkle-eyed one that makes him soften, sincere and fond.
</p><p>
They make their way back toward the woodpile in front of the makeshift stage that’s been rebuilt countless times over the years. David cups his hands around his cider and breathes it in; they’d remembered to add the cloves this year, thank god. 
</p><p>
Pressed in by the crowd, Patrick nudges his shoulder against David’s, and David shoots him a quick smile. 
</p><p>
“How far back does this go? How long have they been doing it?” Patrick asks, leaning in amidst the chatter around them; his breath ghosts over David’s ear. David tries not to shiver.
</p><p>
“Um, over a hundred years, I think,” David manages. Alexis’s mouth twitches but she doesn’t say anything. 
</p><p>
“Wow.” 
</p><p>
They can see Mutt talking with some of the town council off to the side of the stage, waiting more for a quorum of townspeople than any specific time to get started. 
</p><p>
“I love this kind of thing,” Patrick continues into David’s ear, his breath scented with hard cider. “Tradition. Everyone getting together. It’s nice.”
</p><p>
“Sure,” David says with a laugh. 
</p><p>
“I mean it! ‘S nice. And just imagine people just like us doing this a hundred years ago, right in this spot.”
</p><p>
“Oh, I don’t have to.”
</p><p>
“I mean, did they worry about the same things we do?” Patrick continues. “What were they wearing? What did they talk about? Was the bonfire a big part of their year or was it only revived like this recently?”
</p><p>
“Wow. So many questions just coming from all sides,” David says, his hands waving, and Patrick smiles bashfully. Tipsy historian Patrick is painfully adorable, but he can’t think about that too much; it’s a road none of them have successfully navigated. But still, there’s that tug in his stomach, and he <em>wants</em>.
</p><p>
Alexis nudges him and David presses a smile back at her. 
</p><p>
“Roses!” someone calls, unmistakably Stevie. He looks around and spots her red hat in the crowd before a gust of wind blows through and he has to duck to avoid getting a leaf in the eye.
</p><p>
Having lost sight of her, David waves a beringed hand in the air above the crowd so that Stevie can find them and when she does she knocks into Alexis so heavily that Alexis knocks into him in turn. He wrinkles his nose at the stray hairs her fur coat leaves on his wool coat and picks them off, one by one. 
</p><p>
“Do you think we’re getting started soon? I could really go for some processed sugar right about now,” Stevie says, taking a sip of cider. Her eyes are bright and her cheeks are too flushed to be just from the cold.
</p><p>
“How many of those have you had?” David asks suspiciously. She flips him off and he figures that’s answer enough. “Jake’s not coming to this thing, is he?”
</p><p>
“<em>Hell</em> no. When have you ever known him to be civic-minded?”
</p><p>
“I don’t know why you don’t milk it more,” Alexis says, wrapping an arm around Stevie’s waist. “You could be all, hey. This is my day. Come worship me.”
</p><p>
“Yeah, absolutely not.” Alexis just grins and bops her nose, and Stevie rolls her eyes.
</p><p>
“I think it’s time for me to go check on Mutt,” Alexis says cheerfully, and hands her drink off to Patrick, who takes it, bemused. They watch her weave her way through the crowd and up to Mutt, who visibly sighs when she approaches.
</p><p>
“That’s not good,” Stevie says under her breath. 
</p><p>
“Is there a story there?” Patrick asks. When he takes a sip he lifts his eyebrows and David wants to wrap him in cotton.
</p><p>
“He’s always been…” He waves a hand in the air to illustrate the ineffable frustration that Mutt incites in him. “She deserves better.” Stevie raises her cup to toast to that. “Your hat is cute,” David says loudly, changing the subject. Stevie flicks her head from side to side to show off the pom-pom and grins happily. It might just be the cider talking, but he loves her. He <em>loves</em> her and Alexis. 
</p><p>
Before David can embarrass himself, Mutt finally gets on stage, the rest of the council standing awkwardly among the band instruments behind him, shivering a little as the wind picks up. David and Patrick and Stevie are safely cocooned in the middle of the crowd, curled around their hot ciders, and David’s feeling mightily cozy and content. A hundred of these, and he’s still able to be happy to be here. It’s nice to know.
</p><p>
“Hi, guys,” Mutt says into the microphone, and the crowd slowly falls quiet. “Uh. Thanks for being here, for the hundred and tenth annual Schitt’s Creek Bonfire Night.” 
</p><p>
The crowd cheers; Patrick whoops loudly, like he’s at some sports game. Stevie exchanges a look with David. 
</p><p>
Mutt pulls an index card out of his pocket and reads from it in a flat voice: “To people coming from out of town, thank you. To those of you from Schitt’s Creek, thank you. To everyone who helped make this weekend possible, thank you. Tomorrow we’ll have the main event of the festival: the apple pastry contest.” 
</p><p>
He pauses almost reluctantly when the crowd bursts into cheers, David included. Someone wolf-whistles. 
</p><p>
The apple pastry contest is always good fun. Some years a pie wins, some years a tart, and one notable year an apple cider donut had won, and David had talked his way into eating six. 
</p><p>
“Also we’ll have some carnival games for the kids. On Sunday, we’ll have the annual Apple Hop in the barn, so get your dancing shoes ready to hop-ple,” he says flatly. Ted beams at Alexis from below the stage and David can guess who suggested that line. 
</p><p>
Next to him, Patrick laughs guilelessly, and Stevie gives David another raised-eyebrows look. David narrows his eyes at her and she shakes her head with a smile. 
</p><p>
“And now for the main event of the night….” 
</p><p>
From stage left Emir hands Mutt a long lighter, and the whole crowd falls silent as they watch Mutt approach the pile of pallets and take more than a few attempts to light them. 
</p><p>
The fire starts slowly, and Mutt lights a few different pallets to try to get it going more quickly, but then it picks up pace and <em>foof</em>s aflame, sending out a burst of light and heat. The crowd hollers and cheers, the three of them included.
</p><p>
“Happy harvest,” David says, tapping his paper cup against Stevie’s.
</p><p>
“Happy harvest,” she replies, her face glowing in the firelight, her brown eyes dancing. It’s his favorite look on her, bar none, how <em>alive</em> she looks at harvest time.
</p><p>
“Happy harvest,” Patrick repeats, holding out his cup hopefully. David laughs and taps his cup.
</p><p>
“Thank you!” Stevie says cheerfully, and downs the rest of her drink. “What do you think, boys? Should we get more cider and some s’mores supplies before they run out?”
</p><p>
“Oh, yes,” David says, and takes her hand to keep up with her winding way through the crowd; he holds a hand out behind him and it takes a few beats but he feels Patrick’s hand clasp firmly onto his, holding tight so as to not lose him.
</p><p>
Like Alexis, Stevie seems pleased at Patrick’s manners in making sure that they have ciders before he has his. She elbows David and raises her eyebrows approvingly and he bares his teeth at her for a second. Of course, this amuses her more than anything, and as they move down the tables toward the marshmallows, graham crackers, and chocolate bars, she lays into Patrick.
</p><p>
“So, Patrick,” she says as she hands him the bag of marshmallows, “how long are you planning on staying in Schitt’s Creek?”
</p><p>
“About as long as it takes me to finish this stage of my research,” Patrick says good-naturedly, dropping a handful of big puffy marshmallows in his palm before he hands the bag off to the next person. “Maybe a week or two to start with.”
</p><p>
Stevie gives David a significant look and he presses his lips together, focusing on threading some marshmallows onto his skewer. 
</p><p>
“I might stay a while longer,” Patrick continues as they let the tide of the crowd move them down the table. “I’ve been teaching so much that I haven’t made as much progress as my supervisor would like, so I took this semester off teaching to work on my thesis. And also I, uh, called off my engagement a few weeks ago.”
</p><p>
“Oh, no,” David says, trying his absolute best to hold back the disgusting selfish thrill from showing on his face. “I’m sorry for your loss.” Is that what people say? He looks to Stevie, but she’s distracted by trying to get out a marshmallow that’s gotten stuck in the ripped opening of the bag.
</p><p>
“Thanks,” Patrick says. “It was a while coming but it seemed like a good time to get away for a bit.” He clears his throat. “So, should we go roast these bad boys?”
</p><p>
“Ew, please don’t say that again.”
</p><p>
“Ready!” Stevie triumphantly stuffs the marshmallow in her mouth and holds her hand over her head as she leads the way back toward the fire. David grabs the half-full bag of marshmallows and follows in her wake. The out-of-towners don’t pay her much attention, but everyone who knows them greets them happily as they walk by, and her skin glows despite the cold. 
</p><p>
Up on the stage, Emir takes the mic. 
</p><p>
“Hi everyone, I’m Emir, and we’re the Schitt’s Creek Ramblers.” Cheers and whistles roll through the crowd, half of whom are paying more attention to the food than to Emir. “As Mutt said, thanks for coming out tonight. We’re going to get the party going with one of our favorite homecoming tunes, so sing along if you know the words.”
</p><p>
His drummer kicks off the beat, and after a few bars Emir does his best Phil Collins at the standing mic: “Take that look of worry, I’m an ordinary man…”
</p><p>
Flush with cider, David lets his hips wiggle a little to the music as he follows Stevie, and beams at Twyla when she shuffles aside to make room for them by the fire.
</p><p>
The sun has set almost entirely, everyone’s faces now illuminated by the fire alone, their long shadows moving among the trees at the edge of the field.
</p><p>
“Seems so long I’ve been waiting, and I still don’t know what for,” Emir sings, starting to ham it up with winks at the crowd gathered by the stage.
</p><p>
“Those guys are pretty good,” Patrick comments appreciatively.
</p><p>
“That’s Emir,” David says into Patrick’s ear, maybe a little too loudly, judging by Patrick’s reaction. “He has a <em>crush</em> on Stevie.”
</p><p>
“He does not!” she protests.
</p><p>
“Oh, he does too.”
</p><p>
Patrick laughs and David feels himself grinning; life is just really fucking good right now. Emir belts, “take, take me home,” and there’s really nowhere else David would rather be.
</p><p>
“It’s purely lust,” Stevie is saying. “And sometimes a good conversation, but mostly lust. Okay. David. Patrick. Are you ready?”
</p><p>
“Ready for what?” Patrick asks, a little apprehensively. 
</p><p>
“Marshmallow roasting contest. It’s tradition.”
</p><p>
“Bring it on,” David says, holding up his skewered marshmallow next to hers. On Stevie’s other side, Alexis shoves her way forward, holding out her own marshmallow.
</p><p>
“Don’t start without me!”
</p><p>
“Blackjack rules, Patrick,” Stevie says, ignoring them. “You have to be the first to get it as perfectly golden as possible without setting it on fire.”
</p><p>
“Yes, any char and it’s an instant loss,” Alexis adds. 
</p><p>
“I’m up for some friendly competition,” Patrick says gamely.
</p><p>
“Oh no,” Stevie says, shaking her head.
</p><p>
“There’s nothing friendly about this,” David tells him. “There are winners and there are losers and I am going to win this thing and you all are going to lose and it will be <em>incredibly</em> embarrassing for you.”
</p><p>
Stevie flips him off and says solemnly, “Players ready? Three, two, one, ROAST.”
</p><p>
As one they thrust their marshmallows over the crackling fire and David has to fight the giggles.
</p><p>
“This is kind of anticlimactic,” Patrick says after a second.
</p><p>
“Ssshhh.”
</p><p>
The fire is bright in his face and his eyes quickly start to feel dry but he holds off blinking for as long as he can. It seems like almost suddenly that he sees his marshmallow start to turn golden and he shouts; over to his left, a marshmallow goes up in flames, and Alexis howls, “No!”
</p><p>
“Alexis is out!” David shouts.
</p><p>
Pouting, she pulls it out of the fire, blows it out, and, using two graham cracker squares and a piece of chocolate, she pulls it off the skewer. 
</p><p>
“Do I really have to eat it? It’s all sticky, though.”
</p><p>
“I’ll eat it, if you want,” someone says behind them. David doesn’t turn away from his marshmallow, intent on rotating it just far enough above the flames to roast it evenly.
</p><p>
“Ted!” Alexis squeals. “That’s so sweet of you, thank you! By the way, this is David's new friend, Patrick.” 
</p><p>
“Oh, fuck,” Stevie swears, pulling her marshmallow out. It’s not on fire, but it’s definitely darker than it should be, puffy and a little burnt on one side. 
</p><p>
David squints against the fire and anticipation builds as he watches his marshmallow start to turn a very light brown; he carefully rotates it over a glowing section of wood and holds it for as long as his nerves can bear until he has to pull it out and is inordinately relieved to see that it does look perfect. Patrick follows suit and they hold them up, comparing.
</p><p>
“Gotta say, I think you win, David,” Patrick says. His marshmallow looks a lot like Stevie’s, and he pulls off the burnt piece with two fingers and pops it into his mouth, sucking on his fingers a little. David swallows. “Although mine still tastes like a win.”
</p><p>
“Doesn’t count.”
</p><p>
“I concede,” Stevie says reluctantly, examining David’s marshmallow. “Round two?”
</p><p>
“Can I play?” Ted asks, garbled, his mouth still full of marshmallow. He smells like cider even from where David’s standing.
</p><p>
“Mm, yes, please,” Alexis says, before David or Stevie can answer. She knows them too well.
</p><p>
The band moves on to what sounds like a P!nk cover and David and Alexis groan.
</p><p>
“Oh, no, Emir,” David says disappointedly through a mouthful of sticky sugar. 
</p><p>
“What do you have against P!nk?” Stevie asks, offended.
</p><p>
“Oh, nothing. Love her. What I do take offense at is Emir thinking he can pull off a P!nk song.”
</p><p>
“You’re such an asshole.”
</p><p>
“Hey,” Patrick says, licking his thumb, “what do s’mores have to do with apples?”
</p><p>
“Hm?”
</p><p>
“You know, because it’s AppleFest. Why s’mores?”
</p><p>
“Oh, they have absolutely nothing to do with each other,” David assures him.
</p><p>
“I just really like them,” Stevie says. David kicks her ankle. “I mean, the town likes them. You know what I mean.”
</p><p>
Ted starts to ask, “Does Patrick not kn--”
</p><p>
“Ted!” Alexis interrupts, and shares a look with David. “Why don’t you help me find Mutt?”
</p><p>
“Oh, okay,” Ted says agreeably. “What do you even see in him, anyway?” they hear him ask as Alexis leads him away.
</p><p>
A log cracks in the fire and David jumps a little; sparks fly up and he swats them away from his hair.
</p><p>
“I’ll go get us some more cider, yeah?” Patrick offers. He pulls his hat on; his eyes are bright and his nose is red and turns his hopeful gaze on David and, well. Navigable or not, David is fucked.
</p><p>
“Please.”
</p><p>
When he disappears into the crowd, Stevie raises her eyebrows at David.
</p><p>
“What?”
</p><p>
“You know what,” she says. “You heard him before. He’s only staying for a week or two.”
</p><p>
“Or maybe a little longer,” David says pathetically. “Okay, I know. It’s stupid. I <em>know</em>. He’s going back to where he came from and even if he wanted to stay he wouldn’t want to stay with me.”
</p><p>
“David,” Stevie says, something like pity on her face.
</p><p>
“You know, it’s been a hundred years since I dated like a normal person, and even then I couldn’t get anyone to stick around.” He stares into the fire and feels her slip her hand in his. The night’s gotten cold, but her hand, like his, is still at the same lukewarm temperature.
</p><p>
“You could have some time with someone here,” she offers gently. “Alexis has been with Mutt for a while.”
</p><p>
“Well, we both know that’s ending soon.”
</p><p>
“Yeah.”
</p><p>
“I guess it’s my own fucking fault for following her into the woods.”
</p><p>
“Damn right it is.”
</p><p>
Someone does something drunk-stupid on the other side of the bonfire and they listen to the hollering of drunk assholes in response.
</p><p>
“I know it sucks,” Stevie says, not looking at him, which is a classic sentimental Stevie move. “And I’m sorry I couldn’t undo it. But I am glad you and Alexis are with me now.”
</p><p>
“My friendship <em>is</em> pretty great.”
</p><p>
“I was mostly talking about Alexis.”
</p><p>
He kicks her ankle and she elbows him back.
</p><p>
“I was alone for a long time and even though it would be a spectacularly bad idea for us to start having sex again, I’m really glad you’re my friend.”
</p><p>
“Hmph.”
</p><p>
She digs a sharp elbow into his side again and he laughs; he’s never been able to hold a bad mood with her. 
</p><p>
“I’m glad you’re my friend too,” he admits. 
</p><p>
“Thanks. Are we done with feelings? I think I’m getting hives.”
</p><p>
Patrick fights his way back through the crowd with his hands full of more ciders, his cheeks rosy with the cold and, it seems, merriment. 
</p><p>
“Got ‘em!” he says triumphantly. “One more round of marshmallow blackjack?” 
</p><p>
“Mm, thank you,” David says, taking a cup precariously balanced in Patrick’s hands. 
</p><p>
“I’m gonna win this time.”
</p><p>
“Fat chance,” Stevie says. She takes a swig of cider, winces at how hot it is, and then downs the rest regardless. 
</p><p>
David raises his cup to Patrick in a silent toast and follows suit. Patrick watches him swallow, his mouth dropped open a little, before drinking the last cider. Patrick’s bottom lip is shiny and David forces himself to look away.
</p><p>
Emir starts to sing, “Another year you made a promise; another chance to turn it all around…”
</p><p>
Stevie drops her cup on the ground and wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. 
</p><p>
“Ready, players?”
</p><p>
“Ready!” Patrick shouts, right in his ear.
</p><p>
“Okay,” David says with a wince. 
</p><p>
“Wait for me!” Alexis trills behind them, and again shoves her way to Stevie’s side at the fire.
</p><p>
“We’re not waiting!”
</p><p>
“Three!” Stevie shouts. Alexis quickly shoves a marshmallow onto her skewer.
</p><p>
“Two!” David and Patrick join in.
</p><p>
“One!”
</p><p>
“<em>Roast!</em>”
</p><p>
David bops a little along to the band and accidentally knocks into Stevie, who shrieks and body-checks him right back. She’s tiny, so he’s fine, but he shouts offense anyway. 
</p><p>
To his right, Patrick sings along with Emir, “be not afraid of who you really are,” and on Stevie’s other side Alexis is shouting at her marshmallow, as if that’ll help it turn golden faster.
</p><p>
A pallet collapses in the middle of the bonfire and sends up a flurry of sparks. David looks around at his friends, his family, his town, and feels like maybe it’s all worth it, for this; for Alexis’s bright smile, for Stevie’s cackling laugh, for Patrick’s warm brown eyes looking back at him, even if only for as long as the fire burns.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. AppleFest!: A Chaotic Canadian Bake-Off</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
David wakes exactly on time the next morning, but with the unfamiliar feeling of exhilaration vibrating in his bones. He stretches, takes in the film of frost on his window in the early autumn morning air, and smiles. 
</p>
<p>
In the next room, Patrick’s probably still sleeping, cuddled up under the pile of quilts Stevie usually keeps in the spare room’s wardrobe. 
</p>
<p>
They’d walked up to bed together the night before but stopped in the hallway outside David’s room to keep talking. David hadn’t wanted to go to sleep, had rambled a bit about Alexis learning to ride a bike just to keep Patrick with him longer, but Patrick was the first to lean on the wall and then slide down to sit on the floor. He’d patted the hall carpet next to him expectantly, and David had had no choice but to sit next to him, flushed with happiness.
</p>
<p>
At some point, they’d been lying down in opposite directions right there on the floor, Patrick’s elbow at David’s shoulder, their hands brushing with every gesture he’d made until Patrick had grabbed his hand and held it to his chest.
</p>
<p>
The nearly-full moon had shone brightly through the window of the bathroom at the end of the hall, sending a beam of cool light down the dimly-lit hallway, and David had stared at it when he couldn’t bear to look at Patrick any longer. It helped, a little; the moon is a reminder of what he is. Like David, the moon is constant through the years, unchanging, aloft, alone.
</p>
<p>
He tried his best to ignore the small part of him that wondered if it could be different, if Patrick could want even the strange remote part of him.
</p>
<p>
He’d urged Patrick up only when Patrick had started snoring lightly, and gently shoved him into 4C. 
</p>
<p>
It’s not the first time he’d walked home with someone after the bonfire, but it’s the first time he’s woken up all… fizzy after, and alone to boot.
</p>
<p>
Buoyant in his good mood, he texts Stevie, <em>Happy apple cider donut day!!!!!!</em> 
</p>
<p>
Because she is an asshole, she texts back, <em>who is this.</em> He sends her a middle finger emoji and swings his legs out of bed, ready to get fucking going. He can <em>feel</em> that it’s going to be a great day.
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s repulsive bar of soap is still in the shower, but today David smiles at it. Not even poor skincare can drag him down.
</p>
<p>
The walk over to the store is quiet and peaceful, the overnight chilly autumn mist still settled over the town. When David gets to the store he flips all the lights on and puts on some acoustic music before doing all the little routine things that help keep the store running smoothly, and keep him sane. 
</p>
<p>
When he feels steadied, he heads across the street to the cafe and waves at Twyla to get her attention from among the early morning regulars.
</p>
<p>
“Good morning!” she says cheerfully, as always. He may be the immortal one but sometimes it feels like Twyla and her sunny optimism are the true constant of this town, whether he’s in the mood for it or not. 
</p>
<p>
“Morning. Could I get a macchiato and a cinnamon chip muffin?”
</p>
<p>
“Sure thing!” She double-takes as she goes to fix his coffee. “You seem more chipper than usual. Looking forward to the contest later?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, of course. If they know what’s good for them they’ll set aside a dozen donuts just for me.”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know about the donuts, but I’m entering my nana’s apple crumble. I think I really have a chance at winning this year!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh?”
</p>
<p>
“I mean, I know last year my nana’s apple tart wasn’t quite as good as I was hoping it would be.” David tries not to let his face show anything. He’d taken one bite of the tart and had to fight off a gag; he strongly suspected she’d used salt instead of sugar. “But I’ve got a really good feeling this year.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, keep hope alive.” He gives her as sincere a smile as he can manage and gratefully takes his coffee and breakfast from her.
</p>
<p>
“Will do!”
</p>
<p>
He’s so intent on picking a loose cinnamon chip off the top of his muffin that he nearly runs into Patrick outside the cafe.
</p>
<p>
“Patrick!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, David! Sorry.”
</p>
<p>
“No, I’m -- I’m sorry.” David smiles breathlessly at him like a goddamn lovesick teenager. It’s awful. It’s wonderful. 
</p>
<p>
“Can I hang out at your store for a bit? After coffee. I’ve got some more questions.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure, of course,” David says, shaking his head.
</p>
<p>
“Great.” Patrick gives him a tired smile and pats his arm before heading past him into the cafe and David has to force his feet to move. 
</p>
<p>
A good goddamn morning.
</p>
<p>
He even has a few customers before Patrick gets there, mostly people he recognizes from around the inn for the weekend, but it’s quiet again by the time the bell above the door tinkles and David looks up from his phone to see Patrick walk in. 
</p>
<p>
“Sorry that took so long,” Patrick says, unbuttoning his coat. “Twyla was telling me about her nana’s apple crumble.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, yeah, no,” David says quickly. “Do not eat that.”
</p>
<p>
“What? Why?”
</p>
<p>
“Let’s just say that her nana’s apple tart recipe was not even close to winning any prizes last year.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick cringes sympathetically and hangs his coat up on the hook next to David’s. He stuffs his navy toque into a coat sleeve and David wrinkles his nose but has the presence of mind to keep his mouth shut. 
</p>
<p>
“So,” Patrick says, pulling his little notebook and a pen out of his pocket. “Where were we?”
</p>
<p>
“I think you were complimenting my store.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, was I?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, like, effusively,” David says, a grin pulling his mouth to one side, gesturing broadly with his hands. “Just embarrassingly effusive praise for my store.”
</p>
<p>
“That doesn’t sound like me,” Patrick says, tilting his head, his eyes twinkling. “But while we’re on the topic, can you tell me more about how you select your vendors? I imagine they change over the years, with the demands of the market and general overturn of vendors over time.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm. Well, a lot of them are actually legacy -- our cheeses, for example, come from a dairy farm that’s older than the town. Of course, things like specific beauty products have changed over time, but we like to keep vendors for as long as possible, and I think they would agree that the relationship is mutually beneficial.”
</p>
<p>
“Great,” Patrick says absently, writing quickly in his notebook. He bites the side of his thumb when he stops to think before picking up his train of thought again. 
</p>
<p>
“This weekend is actually a good time to get a look at one of our partnerships,” David continues when the silence is too much to handle. “Our organic applesauce is a very popular item year-round and we put baskets of the different varieties that grow locally up front when they’re in season.” He gestures at the baskets at the front of the store. “The orchards host wagon rides and pick-yourself days with a small discount if you show your Apothecary receipt. Although, to be honest, I’d stock them regardless.”
</p>
<p>
His store’s aesthetic generally doesn’t include a ton of color, but only someone with no soul could resist showing off the pink-red honeycrisps, the aptly-named ginger golds, the red and green spartans, all as brightly colored as if someone had painted them.
</p>
<p>
Patrick goes for a closer look and then pulls out his phone.
</p>
<p>
“You don’t mind if I take a few pictures, do you?” 
</p>
<p>
David shakes his head and waves a hand: <em>by all means</em>. He tries to at least pretend to get some work done, refolding and unfolding and refolding Irish wool sweaters, but he watches Patrick out of the corner of his eye. Patrick seems to take his cell phone photography very seriously, taking multiple shots and then swiping through them to make sure that he’s satisfied before taking more or moving on. Eventually David gets lost enough in straightening up the back shelves that he doesn’t notice when Patrick moves on to a live subject: him. 
</p>
<p>
He sees movement out of the corner of his eye and jumps.
</p>
<p>
“Sorry!” Patrick says quickly, putting his phone down. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s fine,” David chokes, putting a hand to his chest. He’s pretty sure he’s not capable of having a heart attack, or at least not one that could kill him, but his heart is <em>racing</em>.
</p>
<p>
“You just looked so focused, I -- Sorry.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s fine. Um. Can I see?”
</p>
<p>
“What? Oh. Sure, of course.” Patrick unlocks his phone and hands it over, his fingers brushing David’s. He’s standing close enough that David can smell that god-awful bar soap, but on Patrick it just smells… clean. Patrick’s fingers have little lines of smudged pen ink and his eyelashes brush his cheek as he taps over to his photo library and David forces himself to look at Patrick’s phone. 
</p>
<p>
The pictures aren’t <em>bad</em>. David’s not stupid; he knows what he looks like. Patrick managed to catch his face at an especially good angle, his cheekbones and brow line standing out as he focused intently on folding. He wonders what Patrick was trying to capture.
</p>
<p>
“Can I see the others?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, of course,” Patrick says, and bites his lip.
</p>
<p>
Patrick does have a good eye, it seems; he’s captured the light in the store as David likes to imagine it, and everything looks high-end, even the tubs of foot cream that remind him cringingly of Roland. 
</p>
<p>
David stops scrolling at a picture of the framed photo that he keeps hanging behind the register. He touches the phone screen and then looks up to the real-life frame, swallowing hard, his good mood from the morning completely wiped away, a dizzying drop.
</p>
<p>
“What?” Patrick asks, stepping closer to see which picture he’s looking at. David gestures at the photo on the wall. He honestly stopped seeing it years ago; it’s long faded into the background of everyday life. 
</p>
<p>
“It’s one of the only pictures we had of all of us,” David says quietly. “My dad framed it for me and gave it to me for my birthday before he died.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, David.”
</p>
<p>
“He was so -- god, this is embarrassing.” David tilts his head back.
</p>
<p>
“I’m so sorry. Do you want me to delete it?”
</p>
<p>
“No, I’m -- it was a long time ago. I just forgot it was there, somehow. It’s dumb.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says softly, and reaches out to rub David’s shoulder. 
</p>
<p>
“We argued all the time. I don’t think we ever really understood each other. But sometimes I just… miss them. You know?”
</p>
<p>
Patrick doesn’t say anything, just keeps rubbing David’s shoulder, until he pulls David into a hug. 
</p>
<p>
It’s the first real hug he’s had in a very long time, he realizes, and he has to make the conscious decision to relax and hug Patrick back. 
</p>
<p>
He wraps one arm around Patrick’s back and the other around his shoulders, and tucks his face into Patrick’s sweater at his collar, blinking hard, breathing him in. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick tightens his arms around him and somehow just keeps holding him, even as David gets a little snotty; he holds him firmly, safely, <em>sweetly</em>. It’s almost more than he can bear.
</p>
<p>
Eventually David pulls himself together and pulls away, laughing self-consciously a little as he wipes at his face. 
</p>
<p>
“I cried the whole drive to Schitt’s Creek from Montreal,” Patrick says conversationally.
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“Just sobbed like an actual child. Bawled my eyes out.”
</p>
<p>
“Fuck off.”
</p>
<p>
“I shouldn’t have been driving, really. It was definitely a hazard.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re the worst.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick smiles and David does his best to pull himself together. 
</p>
<p>
“Honestly, David, loving your family isn’t exactly anything to be embarrassed about.”
</p>
<p>
David opens and closes his mouth.
</p>
<p>
“It’s possible I may have been spending too much time around Stevie and her cynicism.”
</p>
<p>
“No, she’s great. You’ve built such a good family here. I’m, uh. Kind of jealous, actually.”
</p>
<p>
“What? How?”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve moved around a lot. Different cities for college and work and then graduate school. I never really got to build a home like this. You’re lucky, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah. Lucky.”
</p>
<p>
“And hey, would you look at that? It’s almost time for the all-you-can-eat donuts you promised me. I think we’ve earned some apple pastries. What do you say?”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say I ‘promised.’”
</p>
<p>
Patrick laughs. 
</p>
<p>
“I just want to head back to the inn first to call my parents before they send out a search party for sending them to voicemail all day yesterday.” Patrick pulls his coat on, pushes his hat out through his sleeve, and then hesitates. “You’re okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes, fine. Go.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.” Patrick hesitates again, and then smiles. “See you.”
</p>
<p>
When he’s alone in the store again, David turns around slowly, trying to see it through Patrick’s eyes: the family photo his dad framed, the baskets of apples from local orchards, the sweaters carefully folded on the back shelves. 
</p>
<p>
He’s put literally a century of his life into this store; at least half the wear on the floorboards is from his feet alone, and everything on the shelves -- and the shelves too -- were specifically chosen by David. For one hundred years his entire world has been carefully managed around him while he’s stood still, but maybe… The way Patrick smiles at him, the way he holds him, the way he teases him like it’s <em>fun</em>, like it’s affection; he craves more, wants it constantly. He yearns, and it’s such a stupid word, a stupid feeling for someone like him. He thinks about Patrick driving away in a week or two, and wonders if he’ll get emotional as he leaves, or if David is in this alone. 
</p>
<p>
The way Patrick had joked about it, David’s not sure it was entirely a joke; he’s been stuck in place for a hundred years, but he’s been there, when your heart hurts so much that you’re desperate to get away from the pain. 
</p>
<p>
He wonders what caused the breakup.
</p>
<p>
He wonders how soon is too soon for a mortal person to move on nowadays. Surely, given a lifespan of only about seventy years, Patrick wouldn’t want to waste time -- but then what? 
</p>
<p>
It’s the same problem he keeps running up against, at least once every few years at first, and then less often as the time seemed to slip by faster, or at least as he let it: how do you even have a relationship with someone when your lives are moving at vastly different speeds? 
</p>
<p>
It’s one thing when grey hairs slowly start to show, but another entirely when one person is old-old and he’s still the same as he was during the first goddamn World War. Who would want to put effort into a relationship, a relationship with <em>David</em>, just for the two of them to inevitably become more and more estranged over the course of a mortal lifetime?
</p>
<p>
He finds himself drawn to the framed family photo. Luckily Patrick didn’t seem interested in looking too closely: it’s obvious from their clothes and the quality that it wasn’t taken recently, although he could maybe get away with a costume party excuse and the use of a filter. His mother’s dress has exaggerated pointed shoulders and innumerable ruffles down the side of the voluminous skirt; Alexis is wearing a comparatively simpler, lighter full-length dress that she still wouldn’t be caught dead in today. 
</p>
<p>
He can make out his dad’s face slightly blurred, in motion as he began to turn toward his mother; Alexis pouting at the camera; himself with his head lifted haughtily. 
</p>
<p>
They’re standing in front of the inn -- still Stevie’s boarding house then -- and David can still remember Stevie behind the bulky camera contraption, counting off for the umpteenth try to get a good shot of all four of them. His father had framed the one that the three of them looked best in, David remembers, and misses him powerfully. It’s a cruel thing, having all the time in the world stretching out before him, and not having had enough of it with his parents. Not having been able to claw any of it back, even at the end, even after he became this.
</p>
<p>
<em>Found patrick all alone at the town hall</em>, Stevie texts. <em>Stop moping and get over here. Ivan brought apple and cinnamon kugelhopf and i WILL eat it all.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>Don’t you dare</em>, he replies, scowling at his phone, and goes to get his coat.
</p>
<p>
By the time he gets to town hall it’s packed to bursting, but he can still hear Alexis shouting the rules of the apple pastry contest above the din, as she does every year. He slips in past a knot of people eating cake off of tiny paper plates, clustered inconveniently by the door and rudely ignoring his scowl.
</p>
<p>
He’s about to pull out his phone to text Stevie so he doesn’t have to wander the whole goddamn building looking for her when he hears her cackling laugh; he takes the scenic route towards her so that he can get an eye of what the contest’s lineup is while it’s still laid out on the tables that line one side of the hall. There are half a dozen boxes of the apple cider donuts and he has to fight mightily to resist the urge to just grab one.
</p>
<p>
Every contestant has to make five identical pastries, which are then cut up into slivers for voters. There is <em>never</em> enough of everything for everyone, but everyone gets a piece of something and a vote. This year there are cakes and pies and donuts and it all smells absolutely divine. 
</p>
<p>
“Happy eat-your-weight-in-apple-pastry day!” Stevie says when she sees him. “It’s like a national holiday for him,” she tells Patrick, who grins. 
</p>
<p>
“Oh, I’ve heard,” Patrick says, a glint in his eye. “Do you get to judge?”
</p>
<p>
“That’s the best part,” Stevie says. 
</p>
<p>
“It’s a very scientific process of cheer-based voting,” David says, trying to maintain his composure in the face of Patrick’s amusement. “Alexis tried to implement a ballot system once and it descended almost immediately into chaos.”
</p>
<p>
On cue, Alexis whistles loudly and the noise in the hall dims to a low roar.
</p>
<p>
“Hi, everyone,” Mutt says loudly. Alexis motions at him and he reluctantly stands on a chair so they can see him. “The contestants are going to pass around their entries. Remember which ones you like and then we’re going to have a vote by applause in about an hour.”
</p>
<p>
Alexis frowns down at her notecards but quickly lifts her head and flashes a smile at the crowd. 
</p>
<p>
“Is there a prize?” Patrick asks.
</p>
<p>
“Bragging rights.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, serious business.” 
</p>
<p>
The council are wandering the room talking with tourists in some sort of PR move orchestrated by Alexis, and Stevie’s gaze tracks Emir as he passes by, her mouth twitching back when he smiles at her. David elbows her and she rolls her eyes back at him.
</p>
<p>
Twyla passes by in her little apron with a platter of slivers of apple pie and beams expectantly at all of them. David attempts a smile and takes the smallest piece he can.
</p>
<p>
“Mm, thank you,” Stevie says, taking one.
</p>
<p>
“Hope you like it!” 
</p>
<p>
David gingerly takes a bite. At first he thinks it’s not that bad, but then the taste changes, and it’s really, really bad.
</p>
<p>
“Yum,” he manages. Thankfully Twyla spots someone else in the crowd and goes to say hi before he has to elaborate.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” Stevie mouths, dry heaving. Patrick chews with his face screwed up. “What <em>is</em> that?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh good, I missed her,” Alexis says, relieved, as she joins them. She holds out a paper plate with small pieces of a pastry David doesn’t recognize. “What did she put in it this time?”
</p>
<p>
“Balsamic vinegar?” Patrick guesses. Alexis makes a face.
</p>
<p>
“Poor Twy. Well, here, have some of Ivan’s kugelhopf. I had to fight a man for four pieces so it better be worth it.”
</p>
<p>
David takes a piece and replaces it on the plate with the remainder of Twyla’s pie. Alexis puts the plate of abandoned pie slivers on the table behind her and toasts with her piece of kugelhopf. 
</p>
<p>
“To us.”
</p>
<p>
“May the moon be full, the apples crisp, the corn hearty, the harvest plentiful, et cetera, et cetera,” David says.
</p>
<p>
“Hear, hear!” Stevie adds. She takes a bite of the kugelhopf and moans. “God, that’s good.”
</p>
<p>
“So Mutt and I broke up just now,” Alexis says conversationally, looking down at her pastry. David freezes and exchanges glances with Stevie.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” David says. “Well, that’s… probably for the best?” Alexis shrugs. He wraps an arm around her shoulders and she leans into his side.
</p>
<p>
“Are you okay?” Patrick asks. She nods, pressing her lips together.
</p>
<p>
“He’s leaving town,” she says. “He just told me.”
</p>
<p>
“So he’s just had you do all the work organizing this weekend and then he’s just going to leave?” David asks incredulously.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t want to talk about it, David.” 
</p>
<p>
“Do you want the rest of my kugel… thing?” Patrick asks her, holding out his pastry.
</p>
<p>
“No,” Alexis says, but takes it anyway and nibbles a piece of it.
</p>
<p>
“That was very generous of you,” David says, leaning into his shoulder; he can’t help it.
</p>
<p>
“Well, I’m a generous person, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, <em>this</em> isn’t helping,” Alexis says, pointing at them. David tries and fails to rein in the smile he’s sharing with Patrick.
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
She stands on her tiptoes to get a look at the presentation tables. 
</p>
<p>
“I think that’s enough time for deliberation.”
</p>
<p>
“I didn’t get a donut!”
</p>
<p>
“So go get one, David!”
</p>
<p>
“Ugh.”
</p>
<p>
He lets Alexis go with a flicker of his hands. Patrick nudges him and nods over to where someone is still handing out donut pieces. 
</p>
<p>
“See you later,” he tells Stevie. She salutes and spins on her heel to follow Alexis over to where the town council is gathered at the end of the tables. After all this time, he trusts her to keep an eye on his sister, and to take care of her if she needs it. And he’s got some fried goods to find.
</p>
<p>
“Donuts, donuts, donuts,” he mutters under his breath, heading over to where he’d seen them. Patrick follows closely in his wake, saying hello to people in the crowd as they pass through. “How do you know so many people already?”
</p>
<p>
“I’m a friendly guy. Hey, excuse us,” Patrick says to the person serving the donuts. “Can we just -- thanks.” 
</p>
<p>
He grabs an empty plate from the table and unapologetically moves half the donuts from the serving platter onto the plate with easy, confident movements as David watches half in awe.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, um, come with me?” Patrick asks, tilting his head toward the back of the hall. “Grab us some cider.”
</p>
<p>
David takes two cups and follows him back through the crowd, wondering. Alexis reaches out and squeezes his arm when he passes by her and Stevie as they chat with Emir and Ray Butani’s now-adult granddaughter Vidya in the corner, and <em>that’s</em> a conversation download he’s going to need later. 
</p>
<p>
Stevie cracks a joke and she and Emir start laughing, hanging onto each other, and he kisses her hair. Alexis shoots David a wide-eyed glance and he mouths, “Later.”
</p>
<p>
He follows Patrick through to the hall’s back room, which seems to be a staging area for the contestants tonight -- there are aluminum pans and plastic carriers scattered all over, and coats draped over every other available surface. 
</p>
<p>
“Where are we going, exactly?”
</p>
<p>
“You’ll see,” Patrick says, and opens a door that David had honestly thought was a closet, but instead of coathangers and junk there’s a set of steep stairs.
</p>
<p>
“What is this?”
</p>
<p>
“This is a staircase, David.”
</p>
<p>
“No shit. I had no idea this was here.” His voice echoes a little in the enclosed staircase.
</p>
<p>
It seems like they climb two stories, the stairs bending twice, before there’s another door at the top. It must be heavy because Patrick has to throw his shoulder into it to get it to open, and then there’s a rush of cold night air and the moon overhead. 
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” David breathes. They’re on a small deck set into the roof on the back of the town hall and he really, truly, had no idea that this was here. How the fuck did he have no idea that this was here?
</p>
<p>
“Nice, right?” Patrick asks, apparently unaware that he’s just blown David’s mind. “I was talking to Mutt yesterday and he mentioned it.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, if my sister’s had sex up here, I’m leaving.”
</p>
<p>
“I have no way of knowing that, David,” Patrick says patiently. 
</p>
<p>
He leads David over to a blanket already laid out with a little electric lantern next to it and drops down to sit on it, carefully setting the plate of donuts next to himself. David hands him the ciders to hold and gingerly sits down next to him, taking one cup back once he’s situated. The trees back here are tall, and their leaves rustle gently above them.
</p>
<p>
“It’s nice, right?” Patrick asks again.
</p>
<p>
“It’s <em>really</em> nice.”
</p>
<p>
“Good,” Patrick says, sounding absurdly relieved.
</p>
<p>
“Patrick,” David says slowly, “is this a date? Like a date-date?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah,” Patrick says, casual in a way that says he’s definitely not. “I mean. If you want.”
</p>
<p>
“Yes, please. I would like that very much, thank you.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
They grin stupidly at each other and David is <em>too old </em>for this; this is <em>ridiculous</em>. He takes a donut and eats it slowly, trying to think of something to talk about that isn’t completely airheaded.
</p>
<p>
“So, um. Tell me about yourself.”
</p>
<p>
“What do you want to know?” Patrick pops a piece of a donut in his mouth, leaving a sprinkle of cinnamon sugar on his lip, which he licks away. 
</p>
<p>
“Um. Anything. What were you like as a kid?” He pictures a young Patrick, bright-eyed and enthusiastic about the things he loved, determined and stubborn about the things he wanted.
</p>
<p>
“Well, I’m an only child.”
</p>
<p>
“No Alexis in your life? Lucky you.”
</p>
<p>
“Hah. It was kind of lonely, to be honest. Let’s see. I played baseball all through school.”
</p>
<p>
“Did you really?” David asks, looking over him appreciatively. “With the costume and everything?” It’s not that he’s familiar with the sport, but he’s passed by the town’s team playing in the park enough times, dressed in their little outfits. It’s an interesting mental image.
</p>
<p>
“Sure,” Patrick says with a grin. “Still do. And pretty well, if there’s someone motivating me.” David drops his head back and laughs brightly.
</p>
<p>
“Wow, okay. There’s a conversation for later. What else?”
</p>
<p>
“Hm. I’ve always liked collies.”
</p>
<p>
“That’s a dog, right? The fluffy one?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes, David. Like Lassie, you know? One who would notice if I fell down a well or something. Um. And I broke up with my fianceé because I’m gay and she is not a man.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve never met anyone who makes me feel so alive.” 
</p>
<p>
David stops licking sugar from his thumb and meets Patrick’s eyes. 
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know how I’m going to drive away from here.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick has this hard determined look on his face, his eyes glinting in the moonlight, and David faintly realizes his own mouth has dropped open.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick whispers. “Please, can I --”
</p>
<p>
David doesn’t wait for him to finish; he reaches out and pulls Patrick in with a hand on his jaw; pulls him in and kisses him, stilly at first, painfully innocent, until Patrick opens his mouth and David licks his sugared lips, breathes in the cinnamon on his tongue, and it’s like a dam crashes open.
</p>
<p>
Patrick inhales sharply and cups a hand on the back of David’s head, holding him close, kissing him deeper. 
</p>
<p>
He pushes closer, rising up on his knees so that he’s a little taller than David, his broad hands on David’s neck and back as he leans down into him, breathing heavily, kissing him desperately. David reaches blindly behind himself to move the donuts out of the way before leaning back slowly, before he can think the better of it; he needs Patrick over him, the weight of him bearing down. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick pulls away an inch from David’s face and looks him in the eyes; his pupils are blown dark, glinting in the lantern light, his face flushed, his mouth spit-shined. 
</p>
<p>
David looks back up at him, trying to rein in his breathing, trying to read his face. His curling hair is illuminated by the moon behind him.
</p>
<p>
Patrick seems to decide something and kisses David again, gently this time, leaning over him. He brushes David’s hair back from his face and kisses him again, again. 
</p>
<p>
David hooks a leg around Patrick’s, keeping him close, and presses a hand to Patrick’s heart and tries to find grounding in its steady beats.
</p>
<p>
“Um,” he says. Patrick shifts and his leg rocks against David’s swelling cock; David moans, and manages, “Is this ethical?”
</p>
<p>
“What?” Patrick says, stopping entirely. 
</p>
<p>
“Having sex with a research subject.”
</p>
<p>
“David...”
</p>
<p>
“I just wanted to double-check,” David continues, chuckling, “that I won’t have to go in front of your review board and tell them how -- mm, <em>fuck</em>, come on.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, are you joking or serious, because right now I can’t tell,” Patrick says tightly.  David runs a hand down his taut-muscled back, cups his ass, pulls his hips in.
</p>
<p>
“Joking,” he whispers into Patrick’s mouth. “Unless that works for you?”
</p>
<p>
“Jesus,” Patrick pants, rolling his hips, and David tilts his head back at the exquisite pressure.
</p>
<p>
“Do you want to be graded?” David teases, and then gasps when Patrick’s hand stroking up his chest tweaks a nipple. “I’ll give you an A for -- <em>oh</em> -- effort but we haven’t reached the level of -- <em>hah</em> -- execution I was hoping for.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick drops his forehead to David’s, his hairline damp with sweat.
</p>
<p>
“David,” he says through a beautiful smile, “shut up.”
</p>
<p>
“Make me, then.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you sure?” 
</p>
<p>
David nods vigorously. He’s hard as fuck in these stupidly-tight pants, what is Patrick <em>waiting</em> for -- Patrick kisses him gently, firmly, with intent, and David feels him undo his fly and barely has time to think before Patrick’s hand is down his pants, stroking him, and David gasps into his mouth. 
</p>
<p>
He fumbles out for Patrick’s belt and somehow manages to undo it with sex-clumsy hands, the metal rattle of his buckle lost into the rustling leaves around them. Patrick is warm in his palm and <em>so</em> responsive, <em>fuck</em>. 
</p>
<p>
He finds the rhythm pulling Patrick off that has Patrick panting into his mouth, swearing under his breath, but breathing in his sweat and watching his flushed face as he concentrates makes it hard to hold back when Patrick mouths at his neck and it feels like no time at all before David comes into Patrick’s hand. Patrick strokes him through it and as soon as he gets his brain back David returns the favor, watching Patrick’s face tighten and then slacken beautifully, his mouth open in a gasp, and Patrick half collapses on him.
</p>
<p>
David pushes gently at his shoulder until Patrick rolls off him, one hand resting on his chest, his pants still open. 
</p>
<p>
He stares up at the moon and thinks, <em>There</em>.
</p>
<p>
“Wow,” Patrick says eventually. “Um. I wasn’t expecting -- that.”
</p>
<p>
“Good?”
</p>
<p>
“Very.”
</p>
<p>
David turns his head and smiles at Patrick, who looks back at him for a moment and then kisses him again.
</p>
<p>
“Thank you, David,” Patrick says seriously, and David feels his entire face flush. He reaches down and does up his fly. Patrick’s mouth twitches. “Just tell me you won’t think less of me in the morning.”
</p>
<p>
David laughs brightly as he reaches over to tuck Patrick away and zip him up. “Too late,” he teases, and kisses him again under the light of the moon.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. AppleFest!: The Town Hop-ple</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
David’s favorite way to tease Stevie about her not-a-crush on Emir is about the fact that he’s in the dorky town band, which means that of course the AppleFest Hop is normally a goldmine of comedy.
</p><p>
He’s surprised, then, when she willingly walks into his room without knocking a few hours before the dance and shuts the door behind herself. 
</p><p>
He’d closed the store early in case Alexis needed him, because just as often as not, she ends up pulling together the setup of the Hop by herself and ropes him into helping, but so far it’s just been a nice, quiet afternoon. If he’s spending more time daydreaming about Patrick’s smile than actually reading, well, no one needs to know.
</p><p>
“Can I talk to you?” Stevie asks, fiddling with the sleeves of her flannel shirt. David puts his book down and gestures next to him on the bed but she sits on his settee instead, which is fair.
</p><p>
“What’s going on?”
</p><p>
“Um. How are you?”
</p><p>
“Fine.”
</p><p>
“How’s Patrick?”
</p><p>
“I think he’s fine too.”
</p><p>
“Where is he?”
</p><p>
“Out talking to people for his research. I think he said he wanted to get to at least thirty respondents today, which sounds like a nightmare to me, but whatever. I haven’t seen him since this morning.”
</p><p>
“Oh?” She raises her eyebrows and he feels his face grow warm.
</p><p>
“For coffee at the cafe,” he clarifies. “I will have you know that I slept alone last night.”
</p><p>
“But?”
</p><p>
“But we may have hooked up on the roof of the town hall.”
</p><p>
“David!” She whacks his knee with the back of her hand and he laughs self-consciously. 
</p><p>
“It was… really great.”
</p><p>
“I can tell you like him a lot,” she says gently, and the happy floaty feeling dissolves. 
</p><p>
“I’m not going to fall in love with him.”
</p><p>
“Okay,” she says, and then just stops there. He waits but she just sits there, rubbing her palms flat over her thighs.
</p><p>
“Was there something else?”
</p><p>
“Hm?”
</p><p>
“Why are you here?”
</p><p>
“You know Emir?”
</p><p>
“The boybander you’ve been crushing on for years? Yes, I am aware of him.”
</p><p>
“Shut up.”
</p><p>
“No, really. Do you have a poster of him above your bed?”
</p><p>
“David.”
</p><p>
“I mean, I remember Beatlemania. I followed Lilith Fair for a whole summer. I understand.”
</p><p>
“You’re such an asshole,” she says, but she’s smiling a little.
</p><p>
“What about Emir?”
</p><p>
“I think I like him,” she says quietly. She pulls her feet up onto the settee to hug her knees, and he sits on his hands to keep from reaching over and tugging her shoes off. He never thought she’d actually <em>admit</em> it, although they have been looking cozy lately.
</p><p>
“Okay.”
</p><p>
“No, I mean, really like him.”
</p><p>
“Okay?”
</p><p>
“This can’t happen.” She tugs at a loose thread on the hem of her jeans, wrapping and unwrapping it around her finger. “I even told Jake that I didn’t want to hook up anymore.”
</p><p>
“And how did he take that?” 
</p><p>
She gives him a look. “It’s <em>Jake</em>. He didn’t care.”
</p><p>
“Right. And?”
</p><p>
“This is stupid. I’m being stupid, right?”
</p><p>
“Stevie, I - I don’t know what to say.”
</p><p>
“Well, talk me out of it!”
</p><p>
“What do you want to hear?”
</p><p>
“What I want to hear is that I should just talk to him and kiss him and dance with him and <em>marry</em> him and jesus fuck, David.” She scrubs her face with her hands. “I’m so fucked.”
</p><p>
“Well, you can probably do some of those things. We’d have to look into the legality of getting a marriage license when you’re literally an ancient being, though. Remember when you wanted a driver’s license?”
</p><p>
“This is what they wanted, you know. The whole point of being stuck down here was having to endure this bullshit. I’m Tantalus and he’s the fucking apple.”
</p><p>
“But,” he says carefully, “if you could be happy… couldn’t it be worth it? Even if it’s just for a while?”
</p><p>
“No, I’m smarter than this. You know what? Fuck this whole generation. I’m just going to go back to the woods and live there until the next industrial age. Come get me when there are robots.”
</p><p>
“Okay, <em>that’s</em> dramatic.”
</p><p>
His door opens again and Alexis struts in. Exasperated, David throws up his hands.
</p><p>
“Does anybody knock anymore?”
</p><p>
Alexis ignores him and drapes herself over the foot of his bed. 
</p><p>
“I hate men,” she announces.
</p><p>
“Right there with you, sister,” Stevie says, and immediately makes a face and wraps her hands around the back of her neck.
</p><p>
“Mutt just <em>left</em>. He left! He literally got into his little subaru and drove away. Like, there’s a dance tonight, hello!”
</p><p>
“Not to be mean,” David interjects, “but we did warn you.”
</p><p>
“I know. I’ve been thinking about breaking up with him for a while now, but I just couldn’t do it.”
</p><p>
“And you’re here why?”
</p><p>
“Well, David, my relationship just ended and I was hoping for some emotional support.”
</p><p>
He awkwardly reaches over and hugs her shoulders. She pats his arm and he lets go.
</p><p>
“Thank you, David. Also, maybe, could you guys help me set up the dance?”
</p><p>
“So there’s an ulterior motive.”
</p><p>
“That could be good for me,” Stevie says suddenly.
</p><p>
“What?”
</p><p>
“Yeah. It’s good to keep busy, right?”
</p><p>
“I mean, I guess.”
</p><p>
“What do you need?” she asks Alexis, sitting up.
</p><p>
“Um, someone to make sure the food is there. And the drinks. And the music. And clean up whatever Mutt left around the barn.”
</p><p>
“So, everything?” 
</p><p>
“Ha ha, David. Will you, Stevie?”
</p><p>
“I guess I can check on the catering.”
</p><p>
“You sure you don’t want to talk to the band? Emir’s probably there setting up,” Alexis says with a wink, tapping one finger on Stevie’s knee.
</p><p>
“I’m sure.”
</p><p>
“And I’ll just stay here then, shall I?” David says, tugging his book closer.
</p><p>
“Whatever, David. Come on, Stevie.”
</p><p>
Alexis takes Stevie’s arm and drags her out of the room. Stevie looks back at David, a clear <em>what have I gotten myself into</em> look on her face, and he opens his book. 
</p><p>
“Have fun!” he calls after them. 
</p><p>
He’d told Patrick that he would meet him in the lobby so they could head over together, in case he did end up getting roped into running errands for Alexis. Most years he <em>does</em>, and it feels odd to have the stretch of the afternoon to himself.
</p><p>
Without his sister bugging him, time seems to move unbearably slowly, and he starts getting ready two hours ahead of time just for something to do: a nice luxurious shower, doing his hair, sitting around in his robe, getting dressed, deciding to change, deciding to change again, deciding to change again, deciding to change back….
</p><p>
Of course, by the time he’s ready to go, he’s five minutes late. 
</p><p>
He pats his pockets -- phone, wallet -- and checks his reflection, checks his pockets again, and throws himself out of his room to stop himself from checking his reflection again. He’s locking his door when Alexis flounces out of her room, her long gauzy pink dress swirling around her legs. 
</p><p>
“When did you get back?” 
</p><p>
“Around five,” she says breezily. “Stevie really helped, once she actually started helping. I saw Patrick about fifteen minutes ago, by the way.”
</p><p>
“What? Where?”
</p><p>
“He was in the bathroom doing his hair and I forgot my deodorant in there. He looks really good, David. Like, <em>really</em> good.”
</p><p>
“Okay.”
</p><p>
“You’re going to <em>die</em>.”
</p><p>
“<em>Okay</em>.”
</p><p>
She bops his nose with her finger, grinning, and then takes his arm.
</p><p>
“One last check?” she suggests when they get to the top of the stairs.
</p><p>
He clears his throat for the drama and assesses her look: floor-length shimmery pale pink dress, hair up, gold branching twists braided throughout to match her gold bracelets.
</p><p>
“Perfection.”
</p><p>
“Like, goddess-worthy?”
</p><p>
“Sure,” he says, shaking his head. “Can we go now?”
</p><p>
“Just a sec, David.” She brushes lint off his sleeve and adjusts his collar. “You look really nice. Patrick is a lucky guy.”
</p><p>
He looks at her skeptically. “Mkay.”
</p><p>
Two-thirds of the way down, at the top of the last flight, Alexis says out of nowhere, “I feel like we’re getting married.”
</p><p>
“You are <em>the</em> worst.”
</p><p>
On the last flight of stairs the lobby comes into view, and David can see Patrick leaning on the front desk, talking to Stevie. All David can make out is his back, beautiful and broad in his deep blue velvet suit jacket, but it’s undeniably him.
</p><p>
“We’re here!” Alexis calls, and Patrick turns.
</p><p>
Patrick’s mouth drops open slightly as he stares at David, who’s trying desperately not to trip on Alexis’s dress. 
</p><p>
David pulls back the smile threatening to burst on his face and holds his gaze; his palms start sweating a little and he resists the urge to wipe them on his perfectly-creased trousers. A smile blooms on Patrick’s face and he looks, if possible, star-struck. 
</p><p>
Suddenly he’s at the last stair and Patrick is right in front of him and David can’t <em>breathe</em>. He looks like a Hollywood star from years and years ago, his hair neatly coiffed and the lapels of his soft blue jacket framing his face to set off his jawline, his soft smile.
</p><p>
“Hi,” David manages.
</p><p>
“Hi.”
</p><p>
“You look nice.” It’s an understatement of criminal proportions and his brain yells at him but Patrick seems to get it, ducking his head bashfully. He takes Patrick’s sleeve between two fingers and rubs it to gauge the fabric. It’s very well-made, and looks like it was tailored to him, fitting his shoulders exactly right, which is on its own halfway to getting David swooning.
</p><p>
“Thank you. You look… incredible.”
</p><p>
“Well.” David smiles self-consciously, running a hand down the front of his jacket. “This old thing. It’s nothing. Should we go?”
</p><p>
Patrick smiles and presses his mouth to David’s cheek.
</p><p>
“I was going to get you a boutonniere, but it seems the only place you can get a good quality boutonniere last-minute is this little store called the Rose Apothecary, and it was closed this afternoon.”
</p><p>
“I mean, that’s understandable. I hear the manager had a pressing social engagement.”
</p><p>
“I’ll make it up to you,” Patrick murmurs in his ear, and David feels a flush ripple from his head down. 
</p><p>
“I’ll look forward to it,” David hears himself say. Patrick’s eyes are so warm, and focused on him like he can’t look away. It’s been a very long time since he’s been the center of anyone’s attention, and it’s like his body physically doesn’t know what to do except look back.
</p><p>
Patrick’s hair has been combed back on the sides with product, but stubborn waves trace around his ears, and David brushes his fingers through them. Patrick smiles at him and David desperately wants to put his mouth on that smile.
</p><p>
“We should probably get to the barn,” Patrick says softly. 
</p><p>
“Mm. Yes.” David tries to pull himself together. “Stevie? Ready?” He looks around for her; she and Alexis are chatting quietly by the front door, their heads together, Alexis standing with a leg crossed in front of her so her knee brushes against Stevie’s.
</p><p>
“Ready!” Alexis says brightly, and tweaks Stevie’s ribbon bowtie. 
</p><p>
The Hop is always in the barn, which makes it a little awkward now that Mutt’s vamoosed, but it’s already packed with people and music by the time they get there, so it seems no one’s qualms are that heavy.
</p><p>
The wave of humidity and noise from the crowd packed into the barn hits them like a wall. Patrick looks a little overwhelmed.
</p><p>
“Drinks!” Stevie yells over the crowd. David holds his thumb up in the air in agreement and grabs Patrick’s hand to pull him to the bar.
</p><p>
“How are we going to find them again?” Patrick shouts into David’s ear. David shakes his head.
</p><p>
“We always sit over there.” He points over everyone’s heads at the least-crowded corner. “It’s far from the food and the booze and the bathroom so we can usually grab a table.”
</p><p>
“Fair enough. What are we drinking?”
</p><p>
“Four ciders, please,” David tells Vidya Butani, who’s bartending to sell ciders from her orchard. She nods and turns to grab some cups.
</p><p>
“Ah.”
</p><p>
“You’ll be sick of cider by the end of the night, but that’s just the way it goes.”
</p><p>
Patrick helps him carry the drinks back to Stevie and Alexis, who have found a plate of what look like leftovers from the contest yesterday.
</p><p>
“Day-old pastry,” David comments, handing Stevie her cider. 
</p><p>
“Tale as old as time,” she quips, and taps her cup to his. “Twyla’s pie actually isn’t as horrible the second day, as long as you go into it expecting something savory.”
</p><p>
“I’ll take your word for it.”
</p><p>
The crowd cheers and David looks around to see Emir and the rest of the band getting on stage. He gasps theatrically at Stevie and she flips him the middle finger right in front of his face. 
</p><p>
“Do you think if I rushed the stage he’d give me his autograph?”
</p><p>
“I will murder you,” she tells him matter-of-factly. He laughs.
</p><p>
“Hi, everyone,” Emir says into the microphone. “Usually the mayor does this speech, but it looks like he’s retired a little early.” 
</p><p>
The crowd laughs but David checks Alexis’s face. She presses her lips together in a pseudo-smile and shakes her head. 
</p><p>
Honestly, last year he’d been so sure that by now she’d have long moved on to Ted, but she must have been more attached to Mutt than he’d thought. He’ll have to plan a spa day for them, he thinks, and makes a mental note. She’s resilient, his sister, but she’s also more vulnerable than people give her credit for. 
</p><p>
He feels Patrick’s chest jump where it’s pressing against his shoulder with a chuckle at whatever Emir says next and forces himself to tune in. 
</p><p>
“The council and I just want to thank you all again for coming out to visit our little town, especially those of you who came from far away for the weekend. Please remember us when you’re back living your normal lives tomorrow and maybe it’ll be like you’re still here. Let’s make some memories while we can, yeah?” 
</p><p>
David bites his lip and looks at Patrick out of the corner of his eye. He’s not going back tomorrow, but soon. Patrick must sense what he’s thinking, because he grasps David’s hand and caresses it with his thumb, like David is something to be gentle with. David holds on.
</p><p>
“As the Schitt’s Creek Ramblers we like to tour and visit new places, but we always love coming home for the AppleFest, and we hope you come back to celebrate with us next year,” Emir says. “And now we’re going to play some music and you all are going to dance and drink and have a good time, right?”
</p><p>
The crowd cheers and the keyboardist picks out a melody, and the drummer kick-starts the beat.
</p><p>
“I’ve been tryna call; I’ve been on my own for long enough,” Emir sings. He looks over the crowd and then seems to see Stevie at their table off to the side; he smiles down at her and she hesitantly smiles back. He tilts the mic stand toward her like he thinks he’s Elvis and croons right at her,  “Maybe you can show me how to love, maybe…”
</p><p>
“Is he singing at me?” Stevie asks, staring back at him.
</p><p>
“Oh my god,” David says.
</p><p>
“Oh my god,” Alexis repeats. “He knows a song that came out less than ten years ago!”
</p><p>
“This means something, right?” Stevie asks, her eyes locked on Emir, who obviously can’t hear her but winks at her before pivoting to the crowd again.
</p><p>
“There’s only one way to find out,” Patrick says. <em>It might just be a song</em>, David wants to say, but he’s not sure why.<br/>
“Okay,” Stevie says, a little flustered. He’s never seen her flustered before.
</p><p>
“I can’t sleep until I feel your touch,” Emir sings.
</p><p>
“Did someone honestly enter a fruitcake in the contest?” Alexis asks out of nowhere, a tightness around her eyes. She holds up a piece of either really stale or really dense cake, examining it in the low light. 
</p><p>
“Let me try,” David says, happy to change in subject. She breaks off a piece and hands it to him. He chews gingerly for a second and then makes a face at the texture. “Whatever it is, I’m not loving it.” He looks around for something to wash out the taste but his cider cup is empty; Patrick offers his, and David takes it gratefully.
</p><p>
The band switches to a new song, something slower that David doesn’t recognize at first, just the keyboard and a light cymbal and snare. Couples head onto the dance floor and David is happy to watch from his place at the table, next to Patrick. He thinks he might like another cider.
</p><p>
“Hey,” Patrick says suddenly. “Want to dance?”
</p><p>
“Oh, no, I don’t really --”
</p><p>
Patrick holds out a hand and David stares at it for a long second before taking it. Alexis catcalls behind him as Patrick leads him out onto the dance floor and he feels his face heat.
</p><p>
He’d been worried that the song would be uptempo, but Patrick settles an arm around his waist, David’s arm over his shoulder, and holds their other hands between them. 
</p><p>
The band seems to be playing out the slow intro and David’s unsure of what Patrick’s expecting here, but lets him sway them in small, slowly rotating steps. 
</p><p>
Emir starts singing, “If you ever change your mind.” David closes his eyes. He does know this one. “About leaving, leaving me behind, baby bring it to me....”
</p><p>
“Not a good date song,” he mumbles.
</p><p>
“It’s Sam Cooke, David,” Patrick says patiently. “I’ll give you jewelry,” he sings softly into David’s ear, “and money too, but that ain’t all, that ain’t all I’ll do for you.”
</p><p>
David presses his face into Patrick’s shoulder and Patrick holds him tighter, his hand broad and warm across David’s back. The entire barn full of people is dull, muted around them; his entire world narrows to being in Patrick’s embrace. Patrick is steady and warm holding him up, holding him safe.
</p><p>
It’s been so long since he’s been held like this. 
</p><p>
Patrick noses at his jawline, brushes his lips against David’s neck, and it’s unbearably intimate and he wants to be closer still.
</p><p>
He so desperately wants to accept what Patrick is offering him.
</p><p>
Patrick presses a kiss to the side of David’s neck, running a hand up David’s back, and David tries to focus on breathing.
</p><p>
Too soon, the music changes into something dancier that David doesn’t recognize, and the drummer is singing instead of Emir. Patrick stops swaying and holds him for a few moments longer before letting go, and David’s reluctant to step out of his arms. 
</p><p>
“That was nice,” David says, pulling a smile to one side, trying to pull the pieces of himself back together. 
</p><p>
“Hey, do you want to --”
</p><p>
“Yes,” David says immediately. Patrick exhales and smiles back. “I just need to check on Stevie and Alexis and then we can go.”
</p><p>
Patrick follows him back to their table with a hand on his hip and it’s innocent and chaste as hell but it’s like a new major erogenous zone, which is saying something at this point in his life. He’s never had someone’s hands get him going like this before, or had someone treat him so gently.
</p><p>
He’s so <em>happy</em> that he doesn’t notice right away that the atmosphere at their little table has a very different energy.
</p><p>
Alexis stands off to one side, watching nervously as Emir talks with Stevie by the stage.
</p><p>
“What’s up?” David asks, stealing Alexis’s cider. The fact that she doesn’t fight him worries him instantly. 
</p><p>
“Alexis?” Patrick asks.
</p><p>
She shushes them and nods toward Stevie, her forehead creased with concern.
</p><p>
“...back to my place,” Stevie is saying. 
</p><p>
“I’d like that,” Emir says, leaning in to touch her elbow. She smiles coyly up at him.
</p><p>
“She deserves better,” Alexis says quietly. 
</p><p>
“That’s what we used to say to you,” David says. 
</p><p>
“I know, and you were right.”
</p><p>
“And would you want to, um, go to dinner tomorrow night?” Stevie asks Emir, her voice shaking. David’s throat hurts with sympathy. 
</p><p>
“What?” Emir asks.
</p><p>
“At the cafe,” Stevie clarifies. “Unless you want to spring for the Applebees in Thornbridge, but my understanding is that the person who asks out the other person is the one who pays,” she rambles, “and I just can’t justify that to myself, you know, morally speaking,” and as she keeps going, Emir starts to frown.
</p><p>
“I’m sorry, Stevie, if I gave you the wrong impression.”
</p><p>
“Oh no,” Alexis says under her breath. 
</p><p>
“What?”
</p><p>
“I thought I was clear that I’m not looking for a forever kind of commitment,” Emir tells Stevie, whose face goes white. The drummer sings something inane about true love and David briefly wants to throw something at him.
</p><p>
“But --”
</p><p>
“We’re going on tour next week. I told you that. I don’t know how you could have misinterpreted things, but I’m not looking for a relationship with you.”
</p><p>
“That’s it,” Alexis says firmly. She stalks over to Emir and Stevie and points an accusing finger at him. “You have been flirting with her for years. You cannot just lead someone on and then say, oh, sorry, you made a mistake, I don’t actually want you!”
</p><p>
Next to her, Stevie shakes her head slowly.
</p><p>
“You have no idea what it took for her to ask you that,” Alexis continues, red-faced, furious, strands of hair falling out of place.
</p><p>
Stevie backs away from them and quietly steps out the back door of the barn. David takes one look at Alexis, who’s still laying into Emir, and follows Stevie. 
</p><p>
Outside, the wind is already picking up, and he wraps his arms around himself as he squints out into the dark.
</p><p>
“Stevie?”
</p><p>
A slice of lightning cracks the sky and David swears. 
</p><p>
“David?” Patrick asks behind him.
</p><p>
“I have to go after her. Can you tell Alexis?”
</p><p>
“Yeah, of course.”
</p><p>
The skies open with heavy rain rolling across the field in sheets.
</p><p>
“Come on, Stevie,” he mutters, bouncing on his toes, trying to make out any movement in the dark. Another flash of lightning arcs across the sky and he sees Stevie in the distance heading towards the woods, dark hair streaming behind her.
</p><p>
He takes off running, his dress shoes slipping in the rain-soaked grass.
</p><p>
“Stevie!”
</p><p>
This time, he heads into the woods full-tilt. The trees engulf him in darkness again, but this time the woods are loud with the rain pounding on the leaves overhead, and he’s not afraid.
</p><p>
“Stevie!”
</p><p>
His jacket gets caught on a branch and a seam tears; he swears at it and has to wipe the rain out of his eyes to see well enough to detangle himself.
</p><p>
“Really, Stevie?” he mutters to himself. “The thunderstorm is a <em>little</em> much.”
</p><p>
He eventually finds her sitting in the mud at the base of an old oak tree, hugging her knees. 
</p><p>
“Stevie?” His suit is a loss already; he sits next to her.
</p><p>
“Sorry,” she mumbles. “I didn’t mean to lose it like that.” Her hair, glossy-black earlier, hangs in straggles around her face.
</p><p>
“I know.”
</p><p>
“I hate this.” He wraps an arm around her shoulders and hugs her to his side, not really sure what to say.
</p><p>
“I know.”
</p><p>
“Not just this --” she lifts her head and gestures back towards the barn -- “but this.” She gestures at herself. “I <em>hate</em> it. I just want to be…”
</p><p>
“Happy,” David finishes quietly.
</p><p>
“Yeah,” she says, sighing. “Or normal, at least. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? Going and going forever, and never getting anywhere new.”
</p><p>
“Okay, is there any chance it’s a curse that can be broken with true love’s kiss?”
</p><p>
“David.”
</p><p>
“I think anything’s possible.”
</p><p>
She gives him a dark look and tucks her hair behind her ear.
</p><p>
“Don’t put yourself through this,” she tells him. She sounds tired, blown out with the wind. “I don’t want to see you get hurt like this. Not when it’s ultimately my fault.”
</p><p>
“I don’t think you get to decide that.”
</p><p>
She sighs and rests her head on his shoulder. They sit there for a long time at the base of the tree, its bark digging into David’s back, listening to the rain fade to gentle drops on the leaves above them.
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Fun fact: the Stevie/Emir barn scene was the original concept of the whole story: Stevie the goddess raging when Emir dumps her, after spending so long being alone and just this once trying to have a relationship with someone, and the heartbreak of what it took to put herself out there being thrown in her face. But then I got here and Alexis was the angry one.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Falling, Falling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
When Patrick has been in town for another week, he finds out about the town’s movie night coming up and tells David that they’re going. David, naked and sweating underneath him, isn’t in a place to argue.
</p>
<p>
He goes sometimes with Stevie; a few times a year, weather-permitting, the council picks a movie that they project onto a big screen in the field by the barn, and everyone pays five dollars for whatever project the town’s raising funds for, and brings picnics and blankets and little chairs and it’s a whole thing. 
</p>
<p>
According to Patrick, it’s exactly the kind of community engagement he wants to get a sense of, and then sells it as a nice date night with a legit picnic basket and cheese and wine and everything, and David finds himself agreeing -- again, in a position where he was already agreeing heartily with what Patrick was doing with his mouth -- and doesn’t really second-guess it until Alexis wanders into his room while he’s getting ready.
</p>
<p>
“Ew, David, don’t wear that,” she says immediately. He takes another look in the mirror and tugs off the offending sweater.
</p>
<p>
“Can you find something for me to wear, then?” He paces at the foot of his bed, rubbing his bare arms. “I’ve tried on literally everything in my closet.”
</p>
<p>
She nods and goes to his closet. Her voice is muffled when she says, “Ted asked me to go with him tonight.”
</p>
<p>
“And?”
</p>
<p>
“And I asked Stevie to come with us.”
</p>
<p>
David stops pacing and makes a face at her back.
</p>
<p>
“Won’t that be weird?”
</p>
<p>
“Why?” She emerges from his closet with three sweaters for him; black patterned with white stars, white patterned with black tiger stripes, and one he’d honestly forgotten he had, with red and orange flames.
</p>
<p>
“Because when you’re going on a date with someone, usually it’s just you and that other person.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s not a date, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Does Ted know that?”
</p>
<p>
“I mean, I told him I’m not really ready to date anyone new yet.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.” 
</p>
<p>
He really doesn’t have time to argue the point; Patrick had told him to be ready by seven forty-five, and it’s already seven thirty. He lays the sweaters out on his bed for comparison.
</p>
<p>
“Which one?”
</p>
<p>
She points to the one with the flames. He shrugs and pulls it on.
</p>
<p>
“Stevie’s just been working so hard on Vidya’s mayoral campaign to replace Mutt and I thought that she might like a break.”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know why she bothers,” David says absently. “It’s not like it matters.”
</p>
<p>
“Um, David, of course it matters. Imagine if some asshole were elected and we were run out of town.”
</p>
<p>
“LIke that’s going to happen. Then they’d be out a general store manager and an innkeeper and an event planner and the apples they use to generate half the town’s yearly budget.”
</p>
<p>
“It might happen! Anyway, they’re showing the new Ghostbusters, and she hasn’t seen it.”
</p>
<p>
“I know they’re showing the new Ghostbusters,” David says, irritated, pulling on his boots. “Patrick sent me the trailer. Twice.”
</p>
<p>
“That’s so cute, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, well.”
</p>
<p>
Alexis looks over her own outfit in his mirror, blocking his view of himself. She’s in her Cute Look for an Outdoor Movie: jeans that can handle sitting on the ground and boots for muddy patches and a fitted sweater under a short fur coat that won’t hide her legs. It’s probably a sign that they’ve been living together for too long that he knows this. She fixes an invisible strand of hair and he rolls his eyes.
</p>
<p>
“Why did you come in here? Did you want something?” he asks as he ties his boot lace. 
</p>
<p>
“Just.” She hesitates, which is so un-Alexis that he pauses to give her his full attention. Ninety percent, at least. “Don’t use Mutt or Emir as an excuse to not date Patrick.”
</p>
<p>
“Excuse me?”
</p>
<p>
“You like him, David.” 
</p>
<p>
“Wha--”
</p>
<p>
“I know you do. You <em>like</em> him. And he’s sweet and responsible and cute and honestly, David, I don’t see you doing any better.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” he says, curling his lip. 
</p>
<p>
“No, I just mean…. Give him a chance. A real one. Okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, fine. Go, please.”
</p>
<p>
“I love you,” she says, her eyes wide with sincerity. He frowns. “I don’t want you to throw away a good chance at being happy. Even if you might get hurt, I think… I think it might be worth the risk.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, who are you and what have you done with my sister?”
</p>
<p>
“Ugh, whatever, David. I’m going to go get Stevie.” On her way out, she spins on her heel and points at him. “Don’t fuck this up.”
</p>
<p>
When she leaves -- with the door cracked open; how has it been a hundred years and <em>still</em> she can never remember to shut it behind her -- he has to sit there for a moment, just staring into space, until his phone buzzes with a text from Patrick asking where he is.
</p>
<p>
“I’m here,” David announces as he thunders down the stairs. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick is waiting down in the empty lobby, legs crossed casually as he scrolls through his phone, with an honest-to-god picnic basket piled with blankets at his feet. He smiles up at David, open and happy.
</p>
<p>
“Nice of you to make it,” Patrick teases.
</p>
<p>
“I am barely fashionably late.”
</p>
<p>
“Hi.”
</p>
<p>
“Hi,” David returns, and accepts Patrick’s kiss with a smile.
</p>
<p>
“Here, you can carry the blankets.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, can I.” David takes them awkwardly and basically hugs them, uncertain of a better way to carry them. 
</p>
<p>
“So how’s Stevie doing?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, you know. As well as can be expected when the first guy you’ve asked out in literally forever turns you down in public. She’s basically thrown herself into Vidya’s mayoral campaign just so she doesn’t have to think about it.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, I don’t envy her. I think my worst breakup was when my high school girlfriend threw a milkshake in my face in front of half the school because I had to go to an away game instead of taking her to the school dance.”
</p>
<p>
“What a bitch.”
</p>
<p>
“We were fourteen,” Patrick says with a laugh. “It’s a tough age.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re telling me. I remember when Alexis was fourteen she ran off to Nice with some guy and I had to go track her down. I eventually found her in a convent on the Camino de Santiago, trying to convert the nuns back to a city life.”
</p>
<p>
“How old were you?”
</p>
<p>
“Old enough,” David says with a wave of his hand. “Let’s not do the math.”
</p>
<p>
“She’s lucky to have a brother like you.”
</p>
<p>
David doesn’t really know what to say to that, because he’s remembering all the times back before computers were invented, before he had the small comfort of her immortality, he had to find his sister and scoop her out of whatever situation she’d found herself in, usually with little to no help from their parents. He remembers being too late finding her to keep this from happening to them, and his dad’s disappointment that he couldn’t do the one important job that he was entrusted with.
</p>
<p>
He can’t share any of this with Patrick. Does that count as lying? He thinks it might, and tries to ignore the guilty squirm of his stomach. 
</p>
<p>
Why can’t he just enjoy things as they are now? For all he knows, Patrick will break up with him for some other reason -- distance or David’s personality, probably -- and it won’t ever be an issue that he’s spent their entire relationship hiding part of what he is. It’s not like it <em>matters</em>. And why should he ruin this, when they’re both happy?
</p>
<p>
Patrick finds them a spot on the grass at the back of the field and helps David spread out a blanket for them to sit on before he pulls out his little notebook.
</p>
<p>
“I’m just going to go talk to a few people,” Patrick says, already half engrossed in his interview notes, and David waves him off. He’s got a picnic basket to unpack.
</p>
<p>
He finds the cheese and little plastic cups for the wine, ignoring the carrot and celery sticks, and settles back to enjoy the scene around him, to try to stay in the moment. The sun has gone down, but it’s been an unseasonably warm day and it’s not cold yet; the trees lining the field have all turned orange and crimson and pale yellow, making everything look absolutely picturesque. He hopes Patrick thinks to take photos. 
</p>
<p>
He glances around to look for him and Patrick is being cute and studious, taking notes as he talks and laughs with people who are setting up their own picnics, and David feels a flush of pride. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick is working so hard to create something that can help put more good out into the world, help other people connect with each other and make each other better, and he takes it so seriously that it almost overwhelms David when he takes a step back to get the full breadth of his dedication. 
</p>
<p>
Alexis had been a little like that too, he remembers: she’d been incredibly studious while taking a degree by correspondence back before everything was computerized, before there was anybody checking on government IDs as a requirement to learn. 
</p>
<p>
But Patrick also likes David, which is inexplicable. David’s just… he’s like the family photo on the wall of the Apothecary: a little out of place, but constant in a way that fades into the background. 
</p>
<p>
He’s never really <em>minded</em> it so much before, or wished so badly to be anything else.
</p>
<p>
He’s still lost in watching Patrick work when Alexis and Stevie stop by with Ted in tow. 
</p>
<p>
“Hey David,” Ted says happily. “Nice spot! Private,” he adds with a wink.
</p>
<p>
“Gross, Ted,” Alexis says. “That’s my brother.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, gross,” Stevie says. Alexis swats a hand at her in a half-hearted attempt at a high-five.
</p>
<p>
“Thanks,” David says sarcastically. 
</p>
<p>
“Where’s Patrick?” Alexis asks, somewhat accusatory, gesturing with her wrists. 
</p>
<p>
“He’s working,” he informs her, narrowing his eyes.
</p>
<p>
“Well, we’re just over there,” Ted says, pointing at blankets set up off to the side of the crowd. There's a bouquet of orange and yellow flowers peeking out of one of the canvas tote bags. David raises his eyebrows at Alexis, who widens her eyes: <em>I know</em>. He grimaces in sympathy.
</p>
<p>
“Well, I hope you guys have loads of fun in your little threesome over there.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, eat dirt,” Alexis says cheerfully. 
</p>
<p>
“Do you guys have wine?” Stevie asks tiredly. “I’ll even take some chocolate. Or samosas. Oh my god, I would kill for about a dozen samosas right now.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey, guys,” Patrick says, tucking his notebook under his arm. He greets David with a kiss on the cheek and David’s stomach flips; how could he ruin this? “Sorry, Stevie, no samosas.”
</p>
<p>
“Right. You know, I should probably get back to campaigning. Or the inn. I bet the inn needs me.”
</p>
<p>
“No, no, no,” Alexis coos. “Come on; let’s go sit and enjoy the flawless humor of some beautiful leading ladies.”
</p>
<p>
Stevie reluctantly lets Alexis lead her over to their blanket and David watches her go, laughing. 
</p>
<p>
“Poor thing.”
</p>
<p>
“I think Alexis has a handle on the situation,” Patrick says. David gives him a questioning look and he shrugs. “Just saying.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick sits down on the blanket close enough that their shoulders brush and pulls out the carrot sticks and a tub of dip. Ignoring the vegetables, David stretches out his legs and looks around. 
</p>
<p>
He thinks the last time he came to one of these he and Stevie made a drinking game out of the movie. He can’t remember them ever putting together an entire picnic basket or bringing more than one blanket. 
</p>
<p>
“What’s the second blanket for?”
</p>
<p>
“In case it gets cold. Shh, the previews are starting.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, okay.” David watches Patrick’s face instead, his warm brown eyes lit up by the bright screen. His heart is warm, too, David thinks nonsensically. He’d thought to bring an extra blanket in case they got cold; he packed a picnic basket intentionally just for them to enjoy together; he’s sitting out here in the cold for two hours in order to write something that can help the world be a little bit better.
</p>
<p>
“Watch the movie, David,” Patrick says without looking at him, a smile flickering across his face.
</p>
<p>
David grins and scoots closer so their thighs are touching. Patrick takes a grape from David’s plate and tosses it up in the air, catching it in his mouth.
</p>
<p>
“There’s a talent,” David teases. Patrick smiles and knocks their knees together.
</p>
<p>
“Years of practice. I thought you wanted to watch Kate McKinnon on screen. Is she not captivating enough for you?”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, first of all, no one disses Kate.”
</p>
<p>
“Uh huh.”
</p>
<p>
“Second, I thought I had been asked on a date.”
</p>
<p>
“A date, huh?”
</p>
<p>
David grins and traces the seam of Patrick’s jeans along the inside of his thigh.
</p>
<p>
“David.”
</p>
<p>
“What?” David asks innocently. Patrick shakes his head, smiling, and David can’t quite tell in the dark but he’s pretty sure he’s blushing. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick sighs and widens his legs.
</p>
<p>
“Come on,” he says, and David looks at him, confused. Patrick sighs again, gets up, and sits behind David, bracketing him between his legs. “Lean back.”
</p>
<p>
David leans back against his chest and Patrick wraps an arm around his chest. David loops an arm around Patrick’s bent leg, his strong thigh.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, that’s nice,” David murmurs. He feels Patrick press a kiss to the side of his head and he smiles as, on screen, Kate dances for Kristen. 
</p>
<p>
He must drift off, because the next thing he knows Patrick is shaking him awake.
</p>
<p>
“David,” he whispers. “David, my legs are asleep.”
</p>
<p>
“Sorry,” David mumbles, neck aching, and lets Patrick manhandle him out of his lap. David lays on his back and blinks up at Patrick as he stands and stretches. Patrick looks down at him fondly and David smiles sleepily back. They’re having the final battle on screen and all David can look at is Patrick, who sits back down next to him and strokes his hair.
</p>
<p>
“I have to stick around for a bit for follow-ups after the movie but do you want to meet me back in my room?” Patrick whispers. David nods and turns his head, pressing his forehead to the side of Patrick’s hip before sitting up to lean on Patrick’s shoulder. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick pulls a blanket over him, making sure that David’s feet are covered, and they watch the rest of the movie like that, cheering with the crowd when the Ghostbusters hit the Rowan-ghost right between the legs. David registers that it’s a cold night -- Patrick’s pulled on his hat and some gloves, and David’s nose is starting to run a bit -- but here, in Patrick’s embrace, he’s almost warm.
</p>
<p>
David packs up their basket during the last scene -- “Safety lights are for dudes,” he says along with Kate -- and leaves as the credits start rolling to avoid the mad rush, so when he gets back to the inn it’s still deserted. 
</p>
<p>
Instead of following his feet to the room that’s been his for decades, he uses Patrick’s key to open 4C with a thud of his shoulder to unstick the door and looks around at how it’s set up for him. His suitcase is put away, suggesting that Patrick is one of those people who actually unpacks it when traveling instead of living out of it. David approves.
</p>
<p>
Patrick had said he’d only be an hour at most, so David takes half a minute to overthink whether or not to snoop and decides that anything in plain sight is fair game. 
</p>
<p>
Over the desk is a little corkboard and Patrick has thumbtacked little handwritten notes from MOM &lt;3:
</p>
<p>
FOR YOUR RESEARCH -- WE ARE SO PROUD OF YOU. LOVE, MOM &lt;3
</p>
<p>
HI SWEETIE, GRAN ASKED ME TO SEND YOU HER BANANA BREAD RECIPE! ENJOY (AND CUT THE SUGAR IN HALF). LOVE, MOM &lt;3
</p>
<p>
WISHING YOU WERE HERE! LOVE, MOM &lt;3
</p>
<p>
Pinned next to the postcard from the Florida Keys is the AppleFest brochure. At eye height is a Rose Apothecary business card that Patrick must have taken from next to the cash register while David wasn’t looking. 
</p>
<p>
David swallows hard, flexes his hands, and goes to sit on the bed before thinking the better of it. He spies a book on the armchair by the window and gratefully goes for it: it’s one of the old cheesy detective paperbacks that Stevie keeps on a bookshelf in the lobby for guests to borrow, and it’s perfect for him to turn his brain off for a little while. 
</p>
<p>
When Patrick finally gets back, David’s fully engrossed, curled up in the chair, breathing in the scent of Patrick’s soap and a little bit of old dust from the chair.
</p>
<p>
“Good reading?”
</p>
<p>
“It’s terrible and I cannot put it down,” David says absently.
</p>
<p>
“You haven’t been waiting too long, have you?”
</p>
<p>
“Go away, please.”
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, gently pulling the book out of his hands and placing it face-down on the bedside table, “time to pay attention to me now.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, I think that’s my line,” David says, smirking. Patrick smiles and presses a kiss first to David’s cheek, then to his mouth.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says seriously.
</p>
<p>
“Mm.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m going to put the food away.”
</p>
<p>
“Mkay.”
</p>
<p>
“Would you care to help?”
</p>
<p>
David groans but lets Patrick tug him up. Of course, Patrick’s the only one who knows where he wants the food to go, so David just looks around aimlessly, marveling at how much fuller the room feels with Patrick in it.
</p>
<p>
“Normally we keep our overflow wardrobe in here,” he comments.
</p>
<p>
“What?” Patrick stashes the picnic basket on top of the little mini-fridge Stevie must have brought in from one of the long-term rooms downstairs. He moves the leftover cheese and meats into the fridge, the back of his shirt riding up out of his jeans as he squats down.
</p>
<p>
“Me and Alexis. We have the whole floor to ourselves usually. My spring jackets go on a rack here.” He outlines where the garment rack should be with his hands, next to the desk, which is covered in neat stacks of Patrick’s notes and a closed laptop. He appreciates that Patrick looks up to see where David is indicating. 
</p>
<p>
He has a flashback to his mother’s carefully-sketched and -annotated grids of the layout of where each of her wigs was stored, with his father’s unending patience, and has a flicker of gratitude that Alexis isn’t here to mock him for it.
</p>
<p>
“Where are they now?”
</p>
<p>
“Storage, Stevie said. They’ll be well taken care of, if she knows what’s good for her.” 
</p>
<p>
Patrick finally shuts the mini-fridge door and comes up to him, his hands on David’s hips, holding him where he wants him, firm and sure. David’s hands automatically come up to Patrick’s shoulders, rubbing absently.
</p>
<p>
“Do you really want to talk about your spring jackets right now?” Patrick whispers.
</p>
<p>
David shakes his head, pressing back a smile, and lets Patrick kiss him.
</p>
<p>
He’s still not used to it, the way Patrick kisses him like he needs it, like the taste of David’s mouth is a honey elixir. 
</p>
<p>
And David is used to people having sex with him like they want something to dominate, but Patrick is just so incredibly sure of himself and goes after what he wants and what he wants is David feeling good and it’s so incredible that David is just hungry for it, all the time, and when Patrick kisses him like this his knees give out.
</p>
<p>
Patrick slowly walks David backwards until the bed hits the back of his knees, and then he sits heavily, bouncing a little. Patrick reaches down and pulls off his own sweater in one smooth move; David tugs on his undershirt, and Patrick removes that, too, before leaning down to kiss him again. 
</p>
<p>
David pulls away only long enough to carefully take off his sweater and set it on the corner of the bed. Patrick leans down over him, palms on the mattress, and kisses him, covers him; his chest is broad and lightly haired, pressing against David’s, pressing him down.
</p>
<p>
David shudders a breath and rolls his hips up, and again when he feels Patrick’s hard cock pressing back. He pants heavily, trying to kiss Patrick, their wet lips catching briefly before David gasps with another roll of Patrick’s hips.
</p>
<p>
The heat is too much; he reaches down and undoes his pants and shoves them off. Above him, Patrick yanks off his own pants and underwear, and David barely has a moment to appreciate the view -- broad, flushed Patrick over him; it’s a dream -- before Patrick is reclaiming his mouth, and the press of Patrick’s cock against his own is almost enough to push him toward the edge. He swallows and threads his fingers through Patrick’s hair, holding him close, pressing his forehead to Patrick’s, breathing him in, sweat and a little wine and that stupid bar of soap.
</p>
<p>
Patrick tugs David’s knee up a little roughly and he groans at the new angle, Patrick cradled between David’s legs.
</p>
<p>
“David, I,” Patrick pants. “I need.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah?”
</p>
<p>
“Please --”
</p>
<p>
David presses another kiss to his bruised mouth, scraping his teeth across his bottom lip, and Patrick moans as his hips jerk forward. David reaches down to stroke him, relishing his heavy girth, how smoothly he fits in his palm.
</p>
<p>
“Do you have --”
</p>
<p>
“In there.” Patrick throws a careless hand toward the bedside table and David blindly reaches backward and yanks the drawer open, fumbling around before his hand closes on a small bottle, which he drops on the bedspread next to him, and then the familiar square crinkle of a condom. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick grabs the lube and pours it over his fingers. He sits back on his heels, still in between David’s legs, and reaches behind himself as David looks up at him dumbly. It takes a minute, watching the flush on his chest up through his cheeks, his eyes closed, his jaw flexing and slacking as he shamelessly finds what he needs. 
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, his eyes still closed. “Condom.”
</p>
<p>
“Right.”
</p>
<p>
David rolls the condom on himself and reaches under Patrick. Patrick’s eyes fly open and he looks back at David, his pupils blown, and removes his own fingers to let David slip two inside him. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick moans as David thrusts them shallowly, and then he removes them and strokes himself with the same hand, spreading the bit of lube as Patrick watches.
</p>
<p>
“Ready?” David asks, one hand on his cock. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick lines himself up and sinks down slowly, David guiding from below, breathing heavily once he’s fully seated.
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” Patrick says, his throat working, sweat dripping down his temples, beading on his collarbone. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick leans forward and laces his fingers through David’s and slowly begins to rock.
</p>
<p>
David tries to hold back as long as he can. He jerks Patrick off, trying to time it with his thrusts upward, but it’s too much and all he can do is try to keep pace with Patrick, who leans down, shifting the angle of his hold around him, and presses an open kiss to David’s mouth, dragging his lips against David’s.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick pants, an inch from David's mouth. “Oh -- yeah, that -- yeah.”
</p>
<p>
“God, you’re so good.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick moans and rocks his hips.
</p>
<p>
“So good to me, Patrick, you’re so good, I lo--”
</p>
<p>
Patrick inhales sharply and comes, shooting all over David’s chest, a shocked look on his face. 
</p>
<p>
David’s hips jerk up uncontrollably and he brushes Patrick’s sweaty hair back, caresses his cheekbone with his thumb, and when Patrick comes back to himself he smiles softly down at David.
</p>
<p>
“Hey.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick kisses him hungrily and then carefully pulls off of David, dropping on his side next to him, draping a leg over David’s, skin tacky with sweat. 
</p>
<p>
He pours more lube into his palm and kisses David as he jerks him off, his grip adjusting by David’s gasps into Patrick’s mouth until Patrick kisses along his jawline, down to his neck, and sucks <em>hard</em> and David’s back arches and he comes into the condom.
</p>
<p>
He lays there panting until he catches his breath. Patrick kisses his cheek and David carefully pulls off the condom, tying it and dropping it into the little wastebasket next to the nightstand. Patrick keeps watching him and his mouth curves in a smile when David finally looks back at him, Patrick’s fingers skimming over his shoulder, his leg still hooked over David’s knee. He’s so close and David basks, loved loved loved, in it for a moment until he remembers.
</p>
<p>
“Can you get me a wet cloth,” he murmurs. “Please.” Patrick pats his chest and gets up gingerly. David closes his eyes and listens to him pull on the robe from the back of his door and step out into the hallway, closing the door behind himself. David feels like he should get up and, like, clean, but he really can’t move. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick comes back and drops a wet washcloth on David’s chest, gently wiping at the drying mess until it’s gone, careful of pulling on David’s chest hair. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick manages to convince him to move enough to pull the bedspread off and drop it on the floor, and the washcloth on top of it, effectively making the wet spot tomorrow’s gross problem. 
</p>
<p>
David borrows a shirt and clean underwear and they don’t fit quite right but they smell like Patrick. He resumes his spot on the bed, one hand flung over his head and the other on his chest, and Patrick dresses and turns out the lights before climbing in next to him. He listens to Patrick breathe for a while and is nearly asleep, the comforting weight of Patrick dipping the mattress next to him, when Patrick clears his throat.
</p>
<p>
“So,” Patrick says in the dark. David can make out his eyes glinting and he turns on his side to face him.
</p>
<p>
“So,” David says through a yawn.
</p>
<p>
“I heard from my supervisor after you left.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah?”
</p>
<p>
“They said that timing-wise I need to move on from research and start focusing on pulling together a decent draft of my analysis,” Patrick says, and David feels himself go very still.
</p>
<p>
“What does that mean?” 
</p>
<p>
“I guess it means that I should start thinking about heading back to school sometime soon. Maybe after next weekend? I can swing a little more time and get started here, but I do need to go back and meet with them in person.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s quiet and David thinks that’s the end of it, he hopes that’s the end of it; he doesn’t want to talk about this. 
</p>
<p>
“What do you think?”
</p>
<p>
“What do you mean?”
</p>
<p>
“I mean,” Patrick says, impatience bleeding into his voice a bit, “that I’m heading back to school soon and I want to hear your opinion about it.”
</p>
<p>
“I didn’t really get to go to college but I’m generally pro-school.”
</p>
<p>
“Don’t be an asshole right now.”
</p>
<p>
David falls quiet, trying to figure out what to say, how to say it. This is what Stevie’s been warning him about, the voice in his head says, and he can’t make his brain work past the blaring klaxon, the flight instinct.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know what you want from me,” he whispers, going for honesty, at least as far as he can. The mattress dips a little as Patrick sits up.
</p>
<p>
“I want to know what you think, David. Do you want to keep dating after I go back? I-I really like you, David. I <em>really</em> like you.”
</p>
<p>
His entire body is tight with anxious tension and he can’t make his brain <em>work</em>; it’s too much. <em>It’s too much, it’s too --</em> David blinks up at the ceiling and feels a tear roll down the side of his face; he wipes it away angrily. 
</p>
<p>
“I just need to know what you want,” Patrick continues, pleading. “David. I’m not proposing marriage here. I just need to know how you feel about us. Do you want me to come back?”
</p>
<p>
He manages a nod, even though they’re in the dark.
</p>
<p>
“I feel,” he croaks, and clears his throat. “Yeah. I --” <em>It doesn’t matter,</em> climbs up his throat. <em>Ten days or ten years, everyone leaves</em>. But he can’t force it out. He’s pathetic, maybe. He can’t lie about how much he wants this; even if he can hide just how violently he’s fallen, he can’t pretend it hasn’t happened. “Yeah.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” Patrick says, like something’s been decided here, and guilt and shame and dread twist David’s stomach.
</p>
<p>
David reaches out and finds Patrick’s arm; he grips his wrist, thick and solid and alive, and holds onto him. After a beat he feels Patrick press a kiss to the back of his hand and he has to blink hard. Having this is just going to make it hurt more when Patrick leaves, but he can’t bring himself to make it happen, and maybe this is how Alexis has been feeling: the inevitable bearing down, he’s unable to throw himself out of the way; he just wants it too badly. A hundred years of this and he’s just as dumb as he’s ever been, just as crushed by the weight of wanting something he can’t have.
</p>
<p>
Patrick lays back down next to him and pulls David over until David’s head is resting on his shoulder, David’s leg hooked over his. David fingers the collar of Patrick’s sleep shirt, some kind of unsuppressable desperation to keep him here, and Patrick brushes David’s hair out of his face before kissing his forehead gently, almost lovingly. David lays awake for a long time before he eventually sleeps.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. The View from Above</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
He’s dreaming about flying through the summer clouds. 
</p>
<p>
Somehow he’s in a white-gold horseless chariot, soaring through silvery mist and then above the clouds, the sun breaking across his face. 
</p>
<p>
He’s alone, feeling the sun-warmth, until he’s not. He looks around, cold, and wishes for the sun-god back. He feels someone sitting next to him radiating warmth and then it’s Patrick at his side, of course it is, like he’d known he was there all along wearing a Julius Caesar circlet and toga, saying something that David can’t hear.
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, right in his ear.
</p>
<p>
“Mwhat?” David jerks awake, blinking against the pale morning light coming in through Patrick’s open curtains.
</p>
<p>
“Gonna be late,” Patrick says sleepily, relaxing back into his pillow now that David’s up.
</p>
<p>
“Hmm.”
</p>
<p>
“Dav’d.”
</p>
<p>
David fumbles under his pillow for his vibrating phone and somehow manages to hit snooze. 
</p>
<p>
“I hate that you can set your own hours,” he grumbles into his pillow.
</p>
<p>
“Temporary situation,” Patrick mumbles. He has a red pillow crease across his cheek. David lifts a heavy arm to smooth his thumb over it; Patrick blinks, his lashes fanning slowly over his cheek, and smiles under David’s hand. “One day before you know it I’ll have to get up at the crack of dawn and go teach a bunch of hungover university students knowing that you’re still in bed.”
</p>
<p>
David hums and Patrick cracks an eye open.
</p>
<p>
“You’re picturing the blazer with the elbow pads again, aren’t you.”
</p>
<p>
“So what if I am?”
</p>
<p>
His phone starts going off again and he groans and hits snooze again.
</p>
<p>
“Hah, too bad. Off to work with you,” Patrick says, closing his eyes again.
</p>
<p>
“Unfair. How am I supposed to leave when you’re still here?”
</p>
<p>
“Incentive for a productive workday.”
</p>
<p>
In response, David runs a hand over Patrick’s back under the covers, down to the swell of his ass. Patrick smiles.
</p>
<p>
“Just what are you angling for?”
</p>
<p>
“I thought that was obvious,” David whispers into his ear.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, but you have to be quick or you won’t have time for a shower.”
</p>
<p>
“Screw you and your rules.”
</p>
<p>
“Just what a guy likes to hear.”
</p>
<p>
David laughs and kisses him, only once and mouth closed because he’s not getting up to brush his teeth. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick shuffles closer and turns on his side toward David, caressing his face as David slips a hand into his underwear, stroking him gently. Patrick hooks a leg over David’s to hold him close and David watches his face as he loses himself to sex: flushed with their shared body heat under the covers, mouth slack, breathing steadily until his breath hitches and he gasps when David rubs a thumb over the tip of his cock on an up-stroke.
</p>
<p>
Patrick shoves his hand into David’s borrowed underwear and starts jerking him off, clumsily at first, then getting into the rhythm that David likes. He mouths at David’s neck, building up to his own release; sweating, gasping, his lip drags across David’s skin.
</p>
<p>
“Come on,” David pants. “Come on, let go.”
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick gasps. “Oh --”
</p>
<p>
“Let go, Patrick --” and that does it; Patrick comes all over David’s hand, and it drips onto the sheets but then Patrick scrapes his teeth across David’s jaw and he spills into Patrick’s hand.
</p>
<p>
He has a minor hickey when he finally heads to work, and Stevie catcalls at him from the lobby desk. He flips her off, adjusting his scarf, and she laughs at his back. 
</p>
<p>
He’d left Patrick in bed, warm and pliant and inches from sleep, and holds that thought in his mind even as the autumn wind bites at his cheek.
</p>
<p>
Vidya is waiting outside the Apothecary when he gets there but waves off his apology for being late to open.
</p>
<p>
“No, no,” she says, following him inside. “I just wanted to pick up some soaps for the orchard and drop off some of these, if you don’t mind putting them out again?” She sets a stack of Butani Orchards leaflets on the register counter hopefully. 
</p>
<p>
“Of course. And we’re still doing the receipt discount?” David asks, pulling a leaflet towards him.
</p>
<p>
“It brings in good numbers,” she says absently, looking through the rows of different scented soaps. “I don’t know why anyone would leave this town. It’s just so beautiful in the fall, all the trees turning. Have you been out to the orchard yet?”
</p>
<p>
“Not yet.”
</p>
<p>
“David! You’re missing the whole Schitt’s Creek experience!”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve been busy!”
</p>
<p>
“The store’s closed tomorrow, isn’t it?”
</p>
<p>
“Maybe, but --”
</p>
<p>
“Then you three are coming tomorrow,” she says firmly. He knows better than to argue and just nods and puts her soaps in a tote bag for her. “Oh, and bring your new friend!”
</p>
<p>
“Patrick?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes, Patrick!” She snaps her fingers. “I talked to him for a bit at the movie night. He had some good ideas. Smart cookie. Handsome, too,” she adds with a wink. “If I were you I would keep that one,” she says, and leaves in a whirlwind. 
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” David says to the empty store. “Okay.”
</p>
<p>
Years and years ago, Butani Orchards was just an acre down the highway a bit from the town. The eponymous creek itself runs through the woods and loops lazily around the orchard’s original boundary. 
</p>
<p>
Ray had taken some seeds from the small apple trees in the woods and planted them on his acre of land with just the idea of one day having a few rows of trees, and over the decades his children and grandchildren have grown both the trees and the business to be a real boon to the town’s economy. They have a gift shop “barn” and a ticket stand at the entrance to the orchard, and a huge perpetually muddy field serves as a parking lot during the season. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s car bumps slowly down the stake-marked “rows” of the lot until he pulls into the space a teenager is standing in front of, half-heartedly waving an orange flag. 
</p>
<p>
David has been looking forward to spending an afternoon in Patrick’s orbit instead of losing him to his work, but it feels like as soon as they get out of the car, Patrick’s phone rings.
</p>
<p>
“Hi, Ken,” he answers, with an apologetic grimace at David.
</p>
<p>
“Who’s Ken?” Alexis asks under her breath, hooking her arm through David’s for balance as they make their way across the tire-track-lumped field.
</p>
<p>
“That would be his thesis supervisor.”
</p>
<p>
“Eesh. The one grading his term paper?”
</p>
<p>
“Ken’s the professor advising him on his… fine, yes, his final paper. Then he has to submit it and if it gets approved then he has to go in front of a panel of professors and basically argue about why he’s right, and they don’t grade you so much as decide whether you deserve the degree.”
</p>
<p>
“Yikes. That must be stressful.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah,” David says, watching Patrick’s shoulders grow tenser and tenser.
</p>
<p>
“Well, lucky for him, he has you and your domestic eight a.m. lovemaking,” she coos, tapping his nose. He gasps.
</p>
<p>
“You heard that? Pervert!”
</p>
<p>
“Excuse me for going to brush my teeth at eight in the morning, David! The doors aren’t exactly thick.”
</p>
<p>
“Stevie!” David pleads, looking around for her. She appears at Alexis’s other side with a look on her face that promises only trouble.
</p>
<p>
“Do you have a recording of that?” she asks Alexis. “I’d be willing to pay for it.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, I wouldn’t. It was very quiet and tame.”
</p>
<p>
“Alexis!”
</p>
<p>
“Next time,” Stevie tells Alexis, who nods and makes an OK sign.
</p>
<p>
“You are the worst people in the world,” David declares, and slows his feet to let Patrick catch up with him.
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, I have that,” Patrick says, rubbing his forehead with this thumb. “Yeah. Yeah, I can get that to you.”
</p>
<p>
He’s still on the phone when they get to the ticket stand and David ends up paying for the four of them, full price because he forgot to bring a receipt from his own goddamn store and the teenager manning the booth doesn’t give enough of a shit to believe him when he <em>says</em> it’s his goddamn store. It’s only a difference of two dollars each, but the principle of it grates at him.
</p>
<p>
He ends up carrying Patrick’s basket for him, half-listening to Stevie making fun of him and Alexis laughing so hard she snorts.
</p>
<p>
Patrick finally hangs up when they get to the apple-picking trees, which have helpful signs that say which variety each tree is. He rubs David’s back and shades his eyes with a hand as he looks down the seemingly-endless rows. 
</p>
<p>
“Ugh, I always forget about this,” David says, waving a hand in front of his face. There are rotting apples on the ground and a number of <em>very</em> interested bees buzzing between them.
</p>
<p>
“You come apple picking often?” Patrick asks skeptically.
</p>
<p>
“Only when the Butanis force me to come.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, remember that year when Ray told you he would set up a new closet organization system for you if you got other people to come?” Stevie asks.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, and an apple literally fell on your head,” Alexis adds, giggling, and Stevie snorts.
</p>
<p>
“I hate you all. Can someone please get these bees to leave me alone?”
</p>
<p>
“Just ignore them, David,” Stevie says. “The apples are way more interesting than you are.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey, Stevie, why don’t you go get that ladder over there?” David says with a fake smile, pointing at the next row. “That might help you reach the apples on these lower branches.”
</p>
<p>
She rolls her eyes and then, to his glee, goes to get it. 
</p>
<p>
“Don’t be mean, David,” Alexis says.
</p>
<p>
“Excuse me, weren’t you the one who was literally making fun of me a minute ago?”
</p>
<p>
“Who wears a white sweater to go apple-picking, David?”
</p>
<p>
“Says the person wearing overalls like some kind of a farmhand toddler,” he retorts. She makes a face at him.
</p>
<p>
David pulls his white sunglasses out of his pocket and puts them on while Patrick watches.
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“No, I like them,” Patrick says innocently. 
</p>
<p>
“Whatever. Let’s go down here,” David says, and leads him far enough away from Stevie and Alexis that Stevie’s cackling laugh fades between the brushing leaves of the trees. 
</p>
<p>
The orchard is actually quite nice. He can almost imagine that they’re strolling through a park a la Notting Hill, except with bees.
</p>
<p>
“Just to clarify, an apple fell on your head?” Patrick asks, tilting his head. He tugs on a leaf and keeps walking, totally at ease, and it’s inexplicably endearing.
</p>
<p>
“Yes, and it left a bump on my head literally the size of an egg. I still don’t eat macintoshes.”
</p>
<p>
“Noted. What about this kind? The sign says it’s a honeycrisp.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, that’s a good one,” David says, one hand on Patrick’s shoulder as he looks the tree up and down. “Let’s hope the stems are a little sturdier than the last time I was here.”
</p>
<p>
“I promise to give you a heads-up if I see one falling. Shall we?”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, let’s shall.” 
</p>
<p>
Patrick holds onto the ladder and looks at David expectantly, so David starts to climb it, but he only gets two steps up before he can’t will himself to go any higher. There are no railings on the sides to hold onto, and he feels like he’s about to grab onto the air and fall right off if a breeze crosses him wrong. 
</p>
<p>
He picks up his foot but it rubber-bands back to the rung he’s standing on no matter how much he tries to convince himself to put it on the next one.
</p>
<p>
“Something wrong, David?”
</p>
<p>
“Nope.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you sure?”
</p>
<p>
“This is just awfully high,” David says super-casually, forcing a laugh.
</p>
<p>
“Are you afraid of heights?” Patrick looks up at him with an amused smile. “It’s not even that high up!”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, less of the mocking, please.”
</p>
<p>
“Alright, why don’t you hold the ladder and I’ll climb, then?”
</p>
<p>
David swallows and gingerly stretches the toe of his sneaker down, holding on tightly to the rung of the ladder at his shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, holding up his hand. David grabs onto it and grips so tightly that Patrick winces a little, but Patrick doesn’t let go. He guides David back down to the ground with a steady patience that makes David feel stupidly grateful.
</p>
<p>
David feels much better holding the ladder for Patrick, even though there are bees that occasionally bump into his ankles. 
</p>
<p>
“I think these bees are drunk on the fermented apples,” he calls up to Patrick.
</p>
<p>
“Probably,” Patrick says. “Heads up!”
</p>
<p>
David holds up a basket and Patrick drops an apple into it. David looks it over; he doesn’t see any blemishes or worm-holes.
</p>
<p>
“You don’t need to examine each one, David,” Patrick says above him with a laugh. 
</p>
<p>
“I’m not eating anything that a bug has also taken a bite of,” David informs him. Patrick laughs again and shakes his head. “So, um. What did Ken say?”
</p>
<p>
“They like my newest draft proposal overall, so that’s a good sign,” Patrick says, and drops another apple for David to catch. “They want me to address why Schitt’s Creek in particular seems to have a booming economy when towns of comparable size and community engagement aren’t doing quite as well.”
</p>
<p>
“Interesting,” David manages. 
</p>
<p>
“I mean, it’s not like there’s a magical answer,” Patrick continues. “Sometimes that just happens, which is why we don’t generalize from a single sample. So the qualitative data should still hold up from a specific point of view. I just might need to spend some time in Oak Grove and maybe Elmdale to broaden the sample size a little.”
</p>
<p>
“That sounds like a lot of work.”
</p>
<p>
“I do have to do some work to get the degree, David,” Patrick says, smiling down at him. “It’s kind of the point.” David rolls his eyes. “It might be a little tricky, though, finding the time to do that and actually write the thing in between coming back here for visits, but I’ll make it work.”
</p>
<p>
David bites his lip, and blurts, “Are you sure?”
</p>
<p>
Patrick takes one look at him and climbs down the ladder so quickly he might as well just be falling; he pulls David in with an arm around his waist and kisses him fiercely.
</p>
<p>
“Yes,” Patrick says firmly. A smile pulls at David’s mouth and Patrick presses another kiss to the side of his jaw. 
</p>
<p>
“Hello,” Stevie interrupts. David drops his hands from Patrick’s shoulders to face her and Alexis, each carrying a half-full basket, their faces flushed. One of Alexis’s overall straps is twisted. “We’re done, by the way.”
</p>
<p>
“It doesn’t look like it,” Patrick says, stuffing his hand into the pocket of his jeans. “Your baskets aren’t full yet.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, so, can you go over there, please?” David asks, waving a beringed hand toward the end of the row of trees. “I was having a nice afternoon with my boyfriend before you intruded on it.”
</p>
<p>
“No, we’re ready to go,” Alexis says. “I want to lie down. Are you guys done yet?”
</p>
<p>
“We haven’t finished picking this tree!”
</p>
<p>
“Ugh, fine. Stevie, hold the basket. David, I’ll hold the ladder for you. Patrick, can you please be moral support? David has issues with heights ever since he tried to help Stevie with the gutters.”
</p>
<p>
“You -- David, are you sure?” Patrick asks him, cinnamon-brown eyes round and concerned.
</p>
<p>
Alexis whispers something to Stevie and David sets his jaw and eyes the ladder.
</p>
<p>
“Y-yes.”
</p>
<p>
“Seriously, David, if you’re not comfortable, I can do it.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” Stevie groans. “Someone get up there. <em>I’ll</em> do it.”
</p>
<p>
“No!” David hears himself say. He stares down the ladder and holds out his hand expectantly. Patrick takes it and steadies him as he climbs until he’s out of reach.
</p>
<p>
It’s not so bad, actually, once he gets to the top, as long as he doesn’t look down. The breeze carries the scent of fresh apples and autumn leaves, instead of the sickly-sweet rotting apples on the ground. 
</p>
<p>
He can see down the rows and rows of apple trees, and in the distance the small steeple on top of the town hall where he and Patrick had shared their first kiss. He grips the top rung like his life depends on it, but he manages to pick the last few good apples.
</p>
<p>
Below him, Patrick’s phone rings, and David panics for a moment. 
</p>
<p>
“I’ve got you!” Alexis calls, and David manages to look down to see Alexis at the base of the ladder, looking up at him. Patrick is stepping away, his shoulders hunched as he talks into his phone, and David loses sight of him through the leaves. “Just finish up and come down.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” David says to himself. 
</p>
<p>
There’s an apple just an inch beyond his outstretched hand, but he thinks he can reach it, and he would really prefer to finish the job. 
</p>
<p>
He leans, still gripping the top rung tightly, and his fingers brush the apple’s skin, but he doesn’t quite get it. 
</p>
<p>
He shuffles his feet a smidge and reaches again; he gets a hold of it and tugs gently to free it from the branch, but the ladder tips and he’s stepping on air and he lands on his wrist on the ground in an undignified and very painful heap.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, David!”
</p>
<p>
Alexis and Stevie’s hands help him sit up and David sees Patrick sprinting back towards them over Stevie’s shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“Patrick,” he gasps at her, panic flooding: Patrick can’t see, because then he’ll see how fast he heals, and then it’ll be over, and he’s not <em>ready</em>. 
</p>
<p>
Alexis quickly pats him down shoulders to fingers as Stevie pats down his legs. “Ow, <em>fuck</em>,” he hisses sharply when Alexis gets to his lower left arm. She gives him a wide-eyed look and rolls up his sleeve; the bone isn’t poking through his skin, but it <em>really</em> hurts.
</p>
<p>
“David!” Patrick says, white-faced, dropping to his knees. “Are you okay?” He puts a hand to David’s face, checking his eyes, and then notices Alexis holding David’s arm. “Are you hurt?”
</p>
<p>
Alexis looks at David and he lies, “No.” Alexis rolls his sleeve back down and he bites down hard on his lip to keep from yelling. 
</p>
<p>
“Thank god,” Patrick says, brushing his fingers behind David’s ear. 
</p>
<p>
“I think we’re ready to go,” Stevie says finally. 
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, here,” Patrick says, and wraps an arm around David.
</p>
<p>
“I can walk,” he says, minorly irritated. 
</p>
<p>
“Just humor me.”
</p>
<p>
He sighs and lets Patrick hold onto him, trying not to jostle his arm without looking like he’s trying not to jostle it. Patrick carries a basket and Alexis and Stevie somehow manage to carry their half-full baskets plus David’s full one between them. 
</p>
<p>
He’s pretty sure he fractured his arm and it hurts and god fuck fuck fuck. He just has to hide it for, like, twelve hours, but surely Patrick will notice. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick seems distracted, though, in the car; he taps his fingers on the steering wheel in an anxious rhythm and keeps grinding his jaw.
</p>
<p>
“Do you have to get some work done?” he asks Patrick as casually as he can manage.
</p>
<p>
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to at least get a jump on it. You sure you’re okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Mhm,” David lies. He meets Alexis’s eye in the rearview mirror and she dips her head to tap out a text; his phone buzzes a few seconds later. 
</p>
<p>
<em>Teds going to meet us in your room at the inn to look at your arm.</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>Thanks</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>Does it hurt a lot?</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>I might vomit</em>
</p>
<p>
<em>Seriously David. Just tell him.</em>
</p>
<p>
David doesn’t respond.
</p>
<p>
When they get to the inn, he tells Patrick that he’s going to go lie down. Patrick checks his eyes, for a concussion maybe, and nods. 
</p>
<p>
“I’ll come get you for dinner at the cafe later, okay?” Patrick asks, squeezing David’s hip. David lets him kiss his cheek and only when he closes his door does he exhale and cradle his arm.
</p>
<p>
“Holy <em>fuck</em>,” he swears, and Stevie’s right there under his arm, keeping him from going down.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, David. Come on.”
</p>
<p>
Alexis peeks her head into David’s room, checking that Ted’s there, and waves them over. 
</p>
<p>
“God, you’re dramatic,” Stevie says. “Breaking your arm picking apples. Who does that?”
</p>
<p>
“Well, I do, apparently, because here we are,” David says bitterly.
</p>
<p>
She pinches his good arm.
</p>
<p>
“I have to go back to the desk. You good?”
</p>
<p>
“I mean, no, but go ahead.”
</p>
<p>
“I’ll go with you,” Alexis says quickly, and closes the door behind them, leaving David alone with Ted.
</p>
<p>
He sits on his settee, mouth twisted in apprehension, and Ted hurries over with his makeshift medical bag.
</p>
<p>
“I thought you guys were more careful than this,” Ted says, wincing sympathetically as he rolls David’s sleeve up. 
</p>
<p>
“In some ways.”
</p>
<p>
“My dad used to tell me stories about the three of you. Is it true that you fell off the roof of this place?” 
</p>
<p>
David gives a short laugh. “Glad to know that story’s made the rounds.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh no, he didn’t tell me it was you. I just kind of put the pieces together.”
</p>
<p>
“Fantastic.”
</p>
<p>
Ted wraps his arm tightly in an ace bandage, his tongue poking out as he concentrates.
</p>
<p>
“I sort of feel like I’m committing malpractice, not making you go to a hospital.”
</p>
<p>
“There’s no point in getting a cast. It’ll heal up by tomorrow.”
</p>
<p>
“Still.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey, any chance you have some pain pills in that bag?” David asks hopefully.
</p>
<p>
“Sorry, bud. Just over-the-counter stuff.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, it was worth a try.”
</p>
<p>
“Not that it’s any of my business, but you know Patrick, like, loves you, right?” Ted asks, checking the wrapping. 
</p>
<p>
“Excuse me?”
</p>
<p>
“He interviewed me for his research and we got to talking and I got the feeling that he’s thinking long-term here. So I’m not sure I get all the secrecy considering basically the entire town knows and doesn’t care. And he seems like a really good guy, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.” David flits his gaze around the room, not sure where to look; he’s having trouble processing this information coming from Ted, of all people.
</p>
<p>
“And we all know that Stevie would send a legit tornado after anyone who tried to hurt you or Alexis.”
</p>
<p>
David has to laugh at that. “She would.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m just saying. If it helps.”
</p>
<p>
“Um. You know Alexis isn’t looking for a relationship right now, right?”
</p>
<p>
“I know,” Ted says with a smile. “I’m not, either.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay. Right. Um. Thank you for your help, Ted. And for the advice. I think.”
</p>
<p>
“Just be more careful, okay? I went to vet school instead of med school on purpose.” With that, Ted sets a little plastic bottle of OTC pain reliever on the desk and heads out, leaving David alone.
</p>
<p>
He decides to take a nap after all, and cracks the window in his room so that he can hear the play of dry leaves in the slight wind, and before he knows it he drifts off. 
</p>
<p>
When Patrick wakes him with a soft knock on his door, his room is dark and the sharp pain in his arm has dulled to a throbbing. He takes a few deep breaths and tries to put a wall up around it in his mind. 
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” he says, trying for cheerful, as he slips out the door. He kisses Patrick’s cheek and notices the tightness around his eyes, the tension in his shoulders. “You okay?”
</p>
<p>
Patrick smiles, which is somewhat if not entirely comforting, and guides David out with a hand on his back. 
</p>
<p>
“Tough day.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re telling me. Instead of an apple falling on me it was me falling on the ground. I think I’m going to take it as a sign that orchards are just not meant for me.” Patrick’s smile finally reaches his eyes, and something in David’s chest thrills, pleased.
</p>
<p>
“Fair enough. Ready for dinner? What do you think Twyla’s serving today?”
</p>
<p>
David pulls his sleeve further down over the arm wrapping and hums thoughtfully.
</p>
<p>
“Stew.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm. Brisket,” Patrick guesses.
</p>
<p>
“You always guess brisket.”
</p>
<p>
“And one day I will be right, and then I’ll get to choose dessert.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure. And if you pick <em>fruit</em>, I reserve the right to add toppings of my choosing. Like whipped cream and chocolate sauce.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you sure that’s within the rules of the game?”
</p>
<p>
“Y-yes.” David thinks about it. “Yes. Final answer. I know you’re trying to think of a way to use it against me, but I stand by it.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick grins, a real one with his eyes crinkling, and David is bathed in the warmth of his smile.
</p>
<p>
The autumn wind blusters outside, whipping Patrick’s scarf around, and despite himself David laughs as it whirls leaves around them on the walk over to the cafe. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick takes his free hand and gently pulls him to a stop just outside the cafe. David tilts his head in question.
</p>
<p>
“Hold on a second,” Patrick says, and pulls David in by the lapel of his coat.
</p>
<p>
“Mkay,” David says, a smile pulling at his mouth.
</p>
<p>
Patrick brushes his nose against David’s, just barely catching their lips together, and David breathes him, every inch of his skin aware of Patrick. 
</p>
<p>
Finally Patrick kisses him, his soft mouth insistent against David’s, and David’s brain shuts off in favor of his hand coming up to cup the back of Patrick’s head, his fingers curling into the soft short hair at the back of his wonderful neck.
</p>
<p>
Patrick sucks at his lower lip and David inhales sharply; he reclaims Patrick’s mouth and bruises it with his kiss, digging his hips against Patrick’s, relishing how quickly Patrick starts to harden against him.
</p>
<p>
He smiles into the kiss and Patrick pulls back just enough to peck his lips and pepper kisses along his jaw, pulling David in for a hug instead of returning to his mouth. 
</p>
<p>
David gingerly keeps his bandaged arm held out to the side and hooks his other around Patrick’s shoulders, burying his nose into the crook of Patrick’s neck.
</p>
<p>
“What was that for?”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve been looking forward to it all day,” Patrick murmurs into David’s shoulder. “I thought I might explode with wanting it.” 
</p>
<p>
“Mm, that’s nice for my ego.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, I’m sorry, I meant to say that it was more about my general horniness than you in particular.”
</p>
<p>
“And we’re back.”
</p>
<p>
“Just kidding,” Patrick says, scratching gently with blunt fingertips at the nape of David’s neck. He presses a kiss to the underside of David’s jaw and David can feel him smile against his skin. “You are at the center of all my fantasies.”
</p>
<p>
“Mkay, but I’m gonna need to get some food in me if you’ve got multiple fantasies ready to go.”
</p>
<p>
“Noted.”
</p>
<p>
David rubs circles on Patrick’s back and feels Patrick relax into him, trusting David to carry his weight until he sniffs and stands up straight again.
</p>
<p>
“Good?” David checks, still rubbing his shoulder, and Patrick nods. “I’m standing by my stew prediction.”
</p>
<p>
“Is that my cue to let you go in to eat?” Patrick teases, and David nods emphatically. His stomach growls to prove his point and Patrick laughs and pats it. “Alright, David’s stomach. Let’s go.”
</p>
<p>
Twyla greets them with an enthusiastic smile and waves them to their usual booth.
</p>
<p>
“Tell us about your dinner special brisket, Twyla,” Patrick says as he takes off his coat.
</p>
<p>
“Or is the special stew tonight?”
</p>
<p>
“Actually, it’s a turkey pot pie,” she tells them, setting a pair of waters on the table. 
</p>
<p>
“Aha!” David says triumphantly. Patrick shakes his head.
</p>
<p>
“Doesn’t count. That’s not the same thing as stew.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s stew-like. Twyla, final judgment?”
</p>
<p>
“You guys!” she says fondly, not answering at all. “I’ll be right back with the pies.” 
</p>
<p>
“I’m pretty sure I won.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure,” Patrick says, nudging his knee between David’s, and David crooks a smile at him, only breaking eye contact when Twyla clunks down plates of thickly steaming pot pie in front of them. “Wow, look at that,” Patrick says faintly. 
</p>
<p>
“Enjoy!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, we will,” David tells her. She’s too cute to mock, really, but he can’t help a tinge of sarcasm. 
</p>
<p>
David burns his tongue on the first bite and pushes his plate away to wait for it to cool. He’s burnt half his taste buds off but it may be a blessing, judging by the way the carrot pieces are gooey and the crust flour-white.
</p>
<p>
“So,” Patrick says, reaching his hand out on the table for David to take, “I’ve been thinking.”
</p>
<p>
“Have you?”
</p>
<p>
“Hush. About, um. When I come back to town. I was thinking that maybe I could stay with you.”
</p>
<p>
“Wi…. Are you sure?”
</p>
<p>
“David. You’ve been sleeping in my bed every night for the last three weeks.”
</p>
<p>
“Well,” David says, flustered. 
</p>
<p>
“So I was thinking that maybe I could stay in your room instead of paying for a separate one.”
</p>
<p>
“So this is a financial decision.”
</p>
<p>
“David.”
</p>
<p>
“Let me get this straight. You’re sort of asking to move in with me,” David says, and despite himself he can’t help the smile breaking out across his face. Patrick blushes to his ears.
</p>
<p>
“I mean, for practical purposes my apartment at school is home base. But, yeah, when I’m here -- and I’m hoping that’ll be a lot -- maybe we can see how it goes.”
</p>
<p>
“Maybe we can see how it goes,” David repeats, the words ballooning out of him, and his cheeks hurt with smiling. “Um. Just for your information, one day I would like to live somewhere that’s not six feet down the hall from my sister.” One day, one day; one day Patrick might ask to move in with him for real. One day he’s going to find out what David is, and one day after that he’s going to leave. David shoves it all back with the rest of the immortal bullshit and basks in Patrick’s fond smile instead.
</p>
<p>
“Understood.” Patrick says. He strokes the back of David’s hand with his thumb and takes a bite of his pot pie. He makes a face and visibly forces himself to swallow it. “Maybe somewhere with its own kitchen.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, that’s all you.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick pushes his pot pie around his plate and David flags Twyla down to ask for a grilled cheese.
</p>
<p>
When they get back to the inn, David stops by the lobby and shoos Patrick ahead, telling him he’s just going to talk to Stevie for a minute. Patrick waves tiredly at Stevie, kisses David’s cheek, and makes his slow way up the stairs. As David waits for him to be out of earshot, Stevie ignores him and keeps playing her freecell game.
</p>
<p>
“He asked me to move in with him,” he finally tells Stevie urgently. She looks up and blinks at him.
</p>
<p>
“He did what?”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, well, technically he still lives at school. But while he’s here, he’s going to live with me.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
“Stevie!”
</p>
<p>
“What? That sounds fine. Good, even. Aren’t you kind of doing that already? If I want to catch you before you go to work, I stop by Patrick’s room, not yours. And not that I stole it and possibly lost it but the other day I was looking for your fuzzy white scarf and it wasn’t in your closet. I found it in his, along with half your cold-weather transitional wardrobe.”
</p>
<p>
He goes around the back of the desk and sits on the little stool she keeps back there for reaching the higher bookshelves.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know what to do.”
</p>
<p>
“You could try being happy that you have a boyfriend who loves you.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, A, we haven’t said that. B, how do I tell him what I am without freaking him out?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, I don’t know; I’ve never managed it. But you’ll have to, if you want to be with him.” She clicks her mouse a few times. “He seems like a really good guy, David. And I don’t say that about anybody.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re the second person to tell me that today.”
</p>
<p>
“I am very wise.”
</p>
<p>
“By the way, you’re going to return that scarf if you don’t want your bed short-sheeted on a weekly basis. And it had better be pristine. <em>Pristine</em>.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m sure it’ll turn up.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, this is just going to bother me. Move your stack -- no, not -- yeah, that one. Move that over the jack.”
</p>
<p>
He sits with her, more or less helping her play freecell, until she kicks him out from behind the desk and tells him to go upstairs and have sex with the hot guy waiting for him.
</p>
<p>
In his room, he changes into pyjamas and slowly unwraps the bandage. His arm has stopped throbbing and he can flex his hand with no pain at all, as if nothing had ever happened. He rolls up the bandage and stuffs it into the back of his sock drawer.
</p>
<p>
He pads down the quiet hallway of the fourth floor and when he tries the handle to 4C it turns easily in his hand. He shoulders it open as quietly as he can and finds the room dark, Patrick’s slow, even sleep-breaths the only sound filling the room.
</p>
<p>
David shuts the door, wincing at the click of the lock, and tiptoes toward the bed. He carefully pulls up the covers and slips into the empty space in the bed next to Patrick. 
</p>
<p>
“Hm?” Patrick mumbles, still mostly asleep.
</p>
<p>
“Shh.”
</p>
<p>
“D’vid.”
</p>
<p>
David shifts closer and rests his head on Patrick’s shoulder. <em>Maybe, maybe, maybe</em>. He closes his eyes.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Falling, Fallout</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
David goes to the cafe for lunch at his usual time and orders his usual sandwich and hears himself ask Twyla for two. She nods cheerfully and whirls away and he realizes what he’s done. 
</p>
<p>
He just wants to see Patrick, he reasons. They spend so much time together that it’s weird being at the store, not seeing him. And it’s a normal, nice thing to do, bringing someone lunch. 
</p>
<p>
It’s fine. It might make him a little late getting back to the store, but Patrick’s been loosening a lot of his rules lately.
</p>
<p>
Anyway, worst case scenario, Patrick’s already eaten and he leaves the sandwich at the desk with Stevie. 
</p>
<p>
The inn is quiet without the AppleFest guests. He’s not even sure if anyone else is staying, other than Patrick. He doesn’t believe in ghosts, really, at least not the green-goo kind, but the empty inn reminds him forcefully of the dark time after their parents had died, and he and Alexis drifted through its halls aimlessly until Stevie had had the idea to drag them out to Montreal.
</p>
<p>
That was the last time he’d had to find her, he remembers: he and Stevie had been drunk, stumbling around Old Town, and suddenly realized that Alexis was nowhere around. It wasn’t an unfamiliar situation but the panic was acute, so soon after he’d lost their parents, unable to stop any of it. 
</p>
<p>
David had found her twenty minutes later sitting alone on the steps of an old cathedral, staring silently at the raucous groups at the bars across the way. When they called her name, she didn’t seem to hear them until they were right in front of her. David had never been scared like that, seeing his sister so still and quiet and lost somewhere in her head. He’d never felt so useless than on the cusp of having lost all three of them.
</p>
<p>
Anyway. Now, Montreal is a funny story about the time they’d found themselves at a cabaret and David swore loudly to anyone who’d listen that he’d just seen Frank Sinatra smoking a cigarette out back and ended up getting them kicked out for annoying the bartender.
</p>
<p>
Alexis, sitting behind the front desk for some reason, spies him when he tries to sneak past the lobby and loudly calls him over.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, I’m bringing lunch to my boyfriend, so I can’t really stay and chat,” he tells her with a pity-grimace. Alexis coos and hits his arm.
</p>
<p>
“Look at you, being cute and domestic!”
</p>
<p>
“Ugh. Where’s Stevie?”
</p>
<p>
“She’s over at Vidya’s helping with the campaign so I said I’d cover the desk for a bit.” David curls his lip. “Stop! I’ll have you know that I have checked in two whole people.”
</p>
<p>
She’s wearing a plaid flannel shirt over her Cute Professional Look peter pan-collared button-down, which is a little off-putting. She shakes her head, rattling her long gold earrings, and puts on her I-want-something smile.
</p>
<p>
“Um. David.”
</p>
<p>
“Alexis. You know there isn’t actually a uniform for the front desk, right? Stevie just doesn’t have the fashion sense to care about a repeat outfit.”
</p>
<p>
“Stop, David. Ted is hosting dinner at his place tonight.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
“And you’re invited.”
</p>
<p>
“I think I’ll pass.”
</p>
<p>
“Please, David!”
</p>
<p>
“No. Thanks, though.”
</p>
<p>
She groans.
</p>
<p>
“You are literally the worst.”
</p>
<p>
“Mmkay. Bye.” He turns to leave.
</p>
<p>
“David, wait!”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t want to be a third wheel at your weird not-date!”
</p>
<p>
“It’s not a date! It’s a campaign brainstorm session for Stevie. Ted just offered to host because, you know, he’s the only one of us who can cook.”
</p>
<p>
David would protest, but that’s a fair assessment.
</p>
<p>
“Why do I have to go?”
</p>
<p>
“Because I kind of already told him you’d come and I possibly forgot to tell you. Please, David, he’s already bought the food and everything. You can invite Patrick!”
</p>
<p>
“You already told Ted that Patrick was coming, didn’t you.”
</p>
<p>
“I -- well -- fine. Maybe.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay. I am going upstairs now.”
</p>
<p>
“Seven o’clock, David!” she shouts after him. He pastes a smile on for a slightly unnerved-looking guest he passes on the way out.
</p>
<p>
David taps on the door to 4C and pushes it open when Patrick calls, “Come in!” Patrick is hunched over his laptop, notes scattered all over the desk, his hair standing up a bit at the top like he’s been running his hands through it.
</p>
<p>
“Hi.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey, David,” Patrick says, distracted. “What’s up?”
</p>
<p>
“I brought lunch.”
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“Lunch. A sandwich?”
</p>
<p>
“God, what time is it?”
</p>
<p>
“Around one,” David says, and holds out the takeaway bag from the cafe. Patrick turns and his elbow slips on a pile of notes, half of which flutter to the floor.
</p>
<p>
“Fuck!”
</p>
<p>
“Here, let me --”
</p>
<p>
“No, I have --” Patrick crouches on the floor to gather the papers, sorting them back into piles on the desk. “I have a system. Fuck. I can’t --” 
</p>
<p>
“Hey, hey,” David soothes, rubbing his shoulders. 
</p>
<p>
“I have to get this done,” Patrick says weakly. 
</p>
<p>
“You will.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m just having a hard time working like this,” he says, his voice tight, and runs a hand over his head. 
</p>
<p>
David goes very still.
</p>
<p>
“I just, I need my office, and I need my space, and my second monitor, and my bulletin boards, and my filing cabinet. I think -- I think I’m going to have to drive out this weekend and stay at school for a while. Just until I have more of a handle on everything. It’s just --” He throws his pen down on the desk and drops his face in his hands with a muffled groan. “I’m sorry.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s okay,” David hears himself say. “I, um.”
</p>
<p>
“Wait, David.” Patrick pushes his chair back and brushes David’s sleeve, his other hand cradling David’s cheek.
</p>
<p>
David closes his eyes, and feels Patrick press their foreheads together.
</p>
<p>
“I’m going to figure out when I can come back,” Patrick promises. “And I will stay with you. And, hey, you can come visit me in Montreal, too, once I’ve dug myself out of my research.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure.”
</p>
<p>
“Hey.”
</p>
<p>
David finally looks at him and there he is, this beautiful man with the big brown eyes who believes that this can work, because he doesn’t know the whole story. David opens his mouth, no speech planned, ready to spill it out in front of Patrick’s patient gaze, but an alarm buzzes on Patrick’s phone and the moment is gone.
</p>
<p>
He glances at his watch. “Goddamn it, I have a call with my supervisor in ten minutes. I’m sorry, David. We’ll talk later?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, sure, of course,” David says quickly, half-relieved, half-disappointed. “I’ll just leave the sandwich in your fridge.”
</p>
<p>
“Sounds great. Thank you, David.”
</p>
<p>
David carefully sets the bag in his mini-refrigerator next to a bag of apples from the orchard. Patrick had taken one of each kind from their baskets, teasing David that he’d bring full reviews to pin above the bins in the Apothecary once he’d tried them each. There’s a note written on the side of the paper bag in sharpie: <em>honeycrisp 5/5 lives up to its name</em>. David smiles to himself, does his best to tamp down the thrill of pleasure unfurling in his chest. He doesn’t know how he can give this up.
</p>
<p>
“David?”
</p>
<p>
“Yup, all set,” David says quickly, shutting the fridge door. “Don’t forget to eat it, okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” Patrick says, flicking a smile up at him. David fights the urge to smooth his hair down. “Was there something else you wanted to talk about?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes. Dinner tonight at Ted’s.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh?” Patrick’s eyebrows climb even as he types fervently, only about twenty percent focused on David. 
</p>
<p>
“It’s a campaign brainstorm session, apparently. Alexis ‘forgot’ to tell me.”
</p>
<p>
“Sounds good, David. See you later.”
</p>
<p>
David takes the cue to head out but stops at the door. Ignoring his brain, he turns back and kisses Patrick desperately; it’s a slightly odd angle, but Patrick kisses him back, a hand on David’s cheek, his unshaved stubble rasping against David’s.
</p>
<p>
“Bye,” David whispers against his mouth, trying not to give the word too much weight. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick stares after him as he goes, mouth reddened.
</p>
<p>
He descends the empty stairs quickly and nearly runs into an enormous box of campaign signs, which he then realizes are being carried by Stevie, who’s also trying to juggle another box filled with crap like notebooks and posterboard.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, you could have put my eye out.”
</p>
<p>
“Can you help me, please?”
</p>
<p>
David sighs, hooks the plastic bag with his neglected lunch in it over his arm, and gingerly takes the signs box from her. 
</p>
<p>
“You do know that Alexis stole one of your shirts, right?” he asks, wrestling the box through the front door. Stevie stumbles on the sidewalk before she catches her footing. “I think she thinks it’s the front desk uniform. Where are we taking these, anyway?”
</p>
<p>
“Ted’s.”
</p>
<p>
“Fine.”
</p>
<p>
“What’s with you?”
</p>
<p>
“Just… stressed. Patrick. Did Alexis tell you we’re having dinner at Ted’s tonight?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, so? One less freezer-burned cafe meal. It’s fine.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, but my boyfriend is leaving for god knows how long at the end of the week, and I’d really like to not have to share him tonight.”
</p>
<p>
“He’s really leaving that soon?”
</p>
<p>
“Mm.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m sorry, David,” she says, and something bitter and angry in his chest flares up. He narrows his eyes at her. 
</p>
<p>
“Why are you sorry? And why are you being so supportive, anyway? You’re the one who kept telling me not to get attached,” he accuses. She shrugs awkwardly with the box in her hands. “And what’s with the sudden dedication to politics?”
</p>
<p>
“Jesus, David, excuse me for caring about things.”
</p>
<p>
“Doesn’t it ever feel like…” They get to Ted’s clinic and David drops his box in front of the door. “Like we’re just drifting? Aren’t you sick of it? Don’t you want a <em>life</em>?”
</p>
<p>
“David. Of course I do.”
</p>
<p>
“So why are we doing the same goddamn things we’ve been doing for the last hundred years? Can you even remember how many mayors we’ve lived through?” It’s almost involuntary and the voice in the back of his head is yelling at him to stop but the words just keep coming, expelled with the force of everything he’s been shoving down. “How many Emirs did you just let walk away? Did you even <em>try</em> to find a way out of this?”
</p>
<p>
“Wow.” They stare at each other, Stevie as if he’s some asshole she’s never seen before, David trying to catch his breath, hearing it all echo in his head. David opens his mouth to try to take some of that back, but she holds up a hand. “I don’t think I want to talk to you right now,” she says, her voice brittle, and it’s still kinder than he deserves. 
</p>
<p>
Ted comes out as Stevie walks off, her flannel flapping behind her, and he thanks David for bringing the supplies over without commenting. He really is too sweet for any of them. Patrick, too, is too good for him, too good for this.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, Ted?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah?”
</p>
<p>
“I know Alexis told you we’re coming for dinner, but... Patrick still doesn’t know about me. Us. What we are.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, still?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah.” David swallows. “Can you please not tell him? I -- I want to. When the time’s right.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure, bud.”
</p>
<p>
He finds it in himself to crack a smile and thank Ted before drifting back to the store, so much regret and shame roiling around his stomach that he can only nibble at his sandwich. He stares at the apple bins, hating himself, wishing desperately that he could just go back to the night of the bonfire and do it all differently, somehow.
</p>
<p>
Unable to do much else, David sets his mind to a deep clean of the Apothecary. He never really lets it get <em>dirty</em>, but there’s something satisfying about moving all his products and furniture, section by section, and cleaning the shelves and floors underneath so that when he puts it all back, everything just looks a little crisper than before. Newer.
</p>
<p>
He’s so engrossed that he doesn’t really notice the time passing, and before he knows it, the store windows are dark and cold and the bell above the door tinkles. He glances over from where he’s replacing the shampoo bottles and smiles reflexively at Patrick, all adorably bundled up in his coat and hat and gloves and tartan scarf. 
</p>
<p>
“Sorry, am I late? I just wanted to finish this.” He adjusts a bottle so that it’s facing forward and steps back to check that they all look right. 
</p>
<p>
“Take your time,” Patrick says. “I’m a little early.” David hums in response. He hears Patrick stomp his boots on the rubber mat at the door and David focuses on making sure that the bottles are evenly spaced. Suddenly a pair of arms wrap around his middle and Patrick’s cold nose presses against his ear and he makes a sound that’s definitely not a squeak. 
</p>
<p>
“Hi,” Patrick says, hugging him from behind. “Thank you for lunch, by the way. In case I forgot to say it earlier.”
</p>
<p>
“You are welcome.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you almost ready to go? Alexis said that she and Stevie are going together from the inn so we can just meet them at Ted’s, but we should head out soon.”
</p>
<p>
“I still can’t believe Alexis talked me into going to this thing. Ted is a sweet guy but it’s just going to be so awkward and uncomfortable. And this afternoon Stevie and I had a thing, and it’s just going to be -- ugh.” 
</p>
<p>
“How about this,” Patrick says, splaying his hands across David’s chest, his chin hooked over David’s shoulder, “we go for dinner and make an excuse to leave after two hours.”
</p>
<p>
“How about one hour?”
</p>
<p>
“One hour starting from when we sit down to eat.”
</p>
<p>
“Deal.” 
</p>
<p>
David turns in Patrick’s arms and it’s like the entire hellish day shrinks in Patrick’s smile up at him. He kisses him softly, gently, and Patrick reaches up to hold his face. His hands are gloved but it’s still his palm at the corner of David’s jaw; David is held, and he sucks Patrick’s lower lip, as if he can keep them here forever. For his forever, even. But, of course, Patrick is leaving soon, and the spell is going to break. 
</p>
<p>
Finally, when it’s time, he says, “Okay, let’s go suffer through this.” Patrick pats his shoulder, solemn-faced, kiss-bitten mouth.
</p>
<p>
“That’s the spirit.”
</p>
<p>
At first, it seems like they’re going to get through dinner without incident. David and Stevie are perfectly civil towards each other, which of course is odd enough that the others keep giving them strange looks.
</p>
<p>
“Stevie, could you please pass me the bread?”
</p>
<p>
“Of course, David. I’d be happy to pass you the bread. Anything else?”
</p>
<p>
“No, thank you.” He simpers a smile at her and she fakes one right back. 
</p>
<p>
“Um, Stevie,” Patrick says, dropping a hand on David’s thigh under the table. “If you want, I can send you some of my research. I’ve got a lot of data about how community engagement feeds right back into the economy and quality of life, if you think that could be helpful for the campaign. You know, use data to support Vidya’s platform, if she wants to campaign for it.”
</p>
<p>
“That would be great, Patrick. Thank you.”
</p>
<p>
David rubs Patrick’s shoulder and stares across the table at Alexis, willing her to change the subject.
</p>
<p>
“Um, Ted,” Alexis says, flicking her hair over her shoulder. “This lasagna is amazing.”
</p>
<p>
“Thanks, Alexis. I found the recipe online. The woman who wrote it told this whole story above the recipe about how her bernese mountain dog loved it before it got hit by a car.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm. Yum.” 
</p>
<p>
“It was actually kind of disturbing! But I only had all the ingredients for this one, so. Damn my bare cupboards.”
</p>
<p>
They sit in silence for a minute, and the chewing noise grates at David’s spine. 
</p>
<p>
“And how are your fellowship applications going?” Alexis asks. If he were in a better mood, he’d be grateful.
</p>
<p>
“Pretty good. I’ve heard back from most of them and it seems like I’ve got a tough choice to make. You could say I’m all phyla-ed up.” He chuckles and they all glance around at each other before laughing feebly. “Anyway, I did get rejected from one, but it’s all the way up north and you know me. Can’t stand anything colder than zero.”
</p>
<p>
“Mhm!”
</p>
<p>
“I didn’t know you were applying to fellowships, Ted,” Patrick says. 
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, growing up in this town,” Ted begins, then meets David’s eye and ducks his head. “I just feel like, you have to take the opportunities where you find them, you know? I can always come back. But it seemed like time to move on, for now.”
</p>
<p>
“I can appreciate that.” 
</p>
<p>
“So,” Stevie says, rapping her pen on the table. “This is supposed to be a campaign brainstorm session. Patrick, if you could send me that data, that would be great. I think that’s exactly the kind of thing we’re looking for. We didn’t love Mutt --” Alexis clears her throat. “But he was a legacy, sort of, so I really want to make sure that our candidate comes out of the gate as strong as possible.”
</p>
<p>
“Makes sense. And from my interviews, it definitely seems like people appreciate the community engagement you have here. It’s like you have something special, too, that keeps everything invigorated. You know Oak Grove? Only about an hour from here, but their apple orchards don’t generate nearly as much income or engagement. It’s amazing.”
</p>
<p>
“We do have something special,” Ted quips. 
</p>
<p>
“And we can’t use the inn or the Apothecary or the town hall for campaign events because it would be unethical to use town resources,” Stevie reads from her notebook, ignoring him. “Any ideas? The barn?”
</p>
<p>
“Um, can we use the barn?” Alexis asks. “Does the town own that too? Or is it still in Mutt’s family?”
</p>
<p>
“I’ll look into it,” Stevie says, writing a note.
</p>
<p>
“It’ll be cold soon, but you guys could hold signs in shifts at the intersection between the cafe and the Apothecary during rush hour,” Patrick suggests. “You’d get some car traffic and foot traffic. And really, at this level, all you need is just enough name recognition to overcome the number of friends the other guy has. Who is the other guy?”
</p>
<p>
“Kyle Currie.”
</p>
<p>
“Ew,” Alexis says. David wrinkles his nose. 
</p>
<p>
Stevie bites her lip and runs a hand through her hair. 
</p>
<p>
“Patrick, how much free time would you say you’re going to have in the next six weeks?”
</p>
<p>
“Um, little to none. Why?”
</p>
<p>
“But you’re coming back to Schitt’s Creek?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes,” Patrick says firmly. His hand grips David’s knee.
</p>
<p>
“Do you think you could help me out, just a little? We’ve only really ever had legacy mayors, so I don’t really know what I’m doing, and it kind of seems like you do.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick looks to David with his mouth dropped open like there’s a <em>yes</em> ready to go. There’s only one right answer here and David knows it, even though it tastes like sour pennies, giving up the only bits of Patrick he had left. David shakes his head with a shrug.
</p>
<p>
“I’ll do what I can,” Patrick says finally.
</p>
<p>
“Thank you.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, guys, what do you say to some hot cocoa by the fireplace?” Ted says cheerfully. “It’s an electric, but the box said it feels just like the real thing.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure, Ted,” Alexis says. She hooks a finger into the sleeve cuff of Stevie’s shirt and pulls her out of her chair as she’s still reading through her notes, and tugs her over to one of Ted’s loveseats, where they both pull their socked feet up, their legs entwined like it’s second nature. They look like they’re in their own world and David feels acutely his separateness, the incoming loneliness.
</p>
<p>
David helps Patrick help Ted clear the table to the kitchen and Patrick stops him with a hand on his shoulder when he goes to follow Ted and the hot cocoa back out to the living room.
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says quietly. 
</p>
<p>
“Hey.” David holds his arms tightly around his middle, hugging himself, trying to keep contained. 
</p>
<p>
“Are you okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Of course.”
</p>
<p>
“C’mere.” 
</p>
<p>
Patrick pulls him into a hug and David’s face falls to his shoulder automatically, breathing him in, resting finally in his arms. Patrick strokes his back slowly and one by one David’s tightly-held muscles relax.
</p>
<p>
“I’m going to make it work,” Patrick says softly in his ear. David nods against his shoulder. “I’m not letting you go, David Rose.”
</p>
<p>
David sniffs, ungainly and gross, and Patrick just holds him tighter. He doesn’t know and David’s going to have to tell him and then he’s going to leave David here, alone, but right now David can breathe him in.
</p>
<p>
When David pulls himself together, he lets Patrick convince him to go sit with the others in front of the “fireplace” for a little while, even though they’ve technically hit their one-hour benchmark. They sit on the empty half of the sofa next to Ted and if David sits a little too close to Patrick, well.
</p>
<p>
“This is nice,” Ted announces, beaming around at them. 
</p>
<p>
David smiles and nods and leans into Patrick’s shoulder, savoring the weight of Patrick’s arm on his back. He wants to remember this.
</p>
<p>
On the loveseat, Alexis’s feet are in Stevie’s lap with Stevie’s notebook on top of them as Stevie reads her campaign notes quietly aloud to Alexis. Alexis sips her hot cocoa and occasionally offers her commentary, but mostly just looks incredibly comfortable. 
</p>
<p>
She’s in her Cute Winter Lounge Look; how did David not notice? Her pale sweater is big and fluffy and her leggings are stretchy and her socks are <em>fuzzy</em>; she looks almost like a different person, he thinks, but then he realizes that she just looks older, sort of. More mature, like she’s comfortable in her skin. 
</p>
<p>
He wonders when that happened.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, it’s snowing,” Alexis says suddenly, sitting up straight. Even Stevie looks up from her notebook.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, nice,” Patrick says. He gets up to go look out the window and takes David’s hand to pull him up. Alexis drags Stevie over and Ted joins them to admire the thick snowflakes, the first snow of the year, illuminated by the clinic’s flood lights against the dark night sky. It’s a quieter vigil than the AppleFest bonfire, but it, too, marks an inflection point.
</p>
<p>
Patrick settles an arm around David’s waist and David rubs the back of Patrick’s hand with his palm, holding it to his hip, keeping him there. He sips his cocoa and tries to savor its gritty sweetness. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick presses a kiss to the side of his neck like it’s nothing, like he just wanted to, like his affection for David just spills over sometimes and, despite what’s inevitable, David realizes that he would do it all again if it was the only way to get here. It’ll hurt like a motherfucker when Patrick leaves, but at least he’ll have had this.
</p>
<p>
He can keep the memory of him tucked away until it, too, fades. At least he’ll have had this. 
</p>
<p>
“Well, I guess it’s time to hibernate,” Stevie says drily, staring morosely at the snow. “See you guys in February for the start of maple season.”
</p>
<p>
Alexis plays with Stevie’s hair, picking up a few strands at a time and watching them drop.
</p>
<p>
“Hopefully nothing sticks before I have to head back to school,” Patrick says, and the warmth drops out of David’s stomach; he feels like it might reject everything he ate tonight, even the cocoa.
</p>
<p>
Vaguely he notices Alexis poke Stevie’s shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“David, can I talk to you in the kitchen?” Stevie asks stiffly.
</p>
<p>
“If we must.”
</p>
<p>
Alone in the kitchen, Stevie chews her lip and fiddles with the cuffs of her shirt.
</p>
<p>
“Well?”
</p>
<p>
“I’m building up to it! Alexis had a lot for me to say and I wrote it down but my notebook is out there.”
</p>
<p>
David leans against Ted’s countertop and folds his arms. 
</p>
<p>
“What bugs you so much about me trying to campaign for the best candidate?” she asks finally. “You never -- The things you accused me of -- David, you know I couldn’t.”
</p>
<p>
“Do I? One day I followed Alexis into the woods, and the next thing I know, I don’t have a life anymore! It’s just -- existing! I have someone I lo--” He swallows. “I have Patrick, but you and I know that I’ll have to let him go have a life and watch him leave and I’ll just exist and keep existing and that’s it, forever. That’s all we do, and every single time any one of us has a chance to get out and live a little, for a little while, we just -- pull each other back! We’re the crabs,” he says suddenly. Stevie gives him a hugely skeptical look. “The crabs, you know, the ones in the bucket who keep dragging each other back in.”
</p>
<p>
Stevie’s face falls and for a second David regrets it, wishes he could take it back.
</p>
<p>
“I love you, David,” she says, her voice gravelly with emotion he rarely hears. “You and Alexis are my family. All I want, <em>all I want</em>, is to keep you from getting hurt because of this thing. It’s my burden, my fate, and it wasn’t supposed to be yours. I’m <em>sorry</em>, David.” 
</p>
<p>
“Love you too,” he mutters. 
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know how to fix it. I don’t know if there’s a way. The whole point of the gods is that their powers are immutable.”
</p>
<p>
David nods and tightens his arms around himself.
</p>
<p>
“Maybe you could,” she says tentatively. “Maybe you could move out to Montreal with Patrick and live there for a while, until -- until you needed to come back.”
</p>
<p>
David shakes his head before she even finishes talking. 
</p>
<p>
“No. No, I can’t. I can’t even tell him,” he says, and his voice breaks a little. “I know I have to; I just -- it’s too hard.”
</p>
<p>
Stevie leans against the counter next to him, and when he doesn’t say anything, she shuffles close to lean into his side, picking up his arm to wrap around her shoulders. It’s an old familiar pose, older than Patrick himself, older even than Patrick’s mother who writes in all-caps and signs her letters with a heart.
</p>
<p>
The very first time he’d hugged Stevie was when they’d found the bulky camera at the church’s charity shop and tested it to make sure it worked and it <em>had</em>. Everything in the news had been so bleak and his family’s money was surely gone and he didn’t have any idea how he would move forward in life but the camera worked. 
</p>
<p>
It was a different time, a different life. 
</p>
<p>
“David, you have to tell him,” she says. He shakes his head. “You can’t just break up with him and expect you both to move on.”
</p>
<p>
“What good will it do, though? ‘Hey, I’m immortal, by the way, no pressure!’”
</p>
<p>
“What,” Patrick says.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Would That I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The first scene deals with David's survivor's guilt around the deaths of Moira and Johnny. It's not explicit, but Moira died of cancer in the 1930s and Johnny passed away not long after that. If you want to skip that bit, stop reading at "I won't get a single..." and start again three paragraphs later at "David, I'm so sorry...."</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
David’s head jerks up so fast he feels his neck twinge.
</p><p>
“Patrick.”
</p><p>
“Um. Hi, David. Stevie.”
</p><p>
“Hi, Patrick,” Stevie says awkwardly. “I’m just gonna let you two…” She slinks out of the kitchen, leaving David guppy-mouthed by himself.
</p><p>
“That -- what you just said. You weren’t joking. Were you joking?”
</p><p>
“I, um.”
</p><p>
“No. I’m hallucinating. Ken finally pushed me over the edge and I’m back in my room buried in paper, hallucinating.”
</p><p>
“Patrick, please, I can explain.”
</p><p>
“Oh, please do.”
</p><p>
David flexes his hands, bites his lip.
</p><p>
“Anytime now, David.”
</p><p>
David opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He’s hyper-aware of Steve, Alexis, and Ted in the next room, probably all talking about him, trying to listen to him attempt to explain. His collar feels tight around his throat and his breath comes shallowly, like there’s a sadist tightening a corset around his chest.
</p><p>
“Can we, um. Go outside, maybe?”
</p><p>
Patrick waves a hand toward their boots, sitting in Ted’s boot tray where they’d left them a mere two hours ago, and they leave without telling the others. Ted’s apartment is small enough that they all heard everything, anyway.
</p><p>
It’s still snowing. David wishes he’d brought a hat; the melting flakes are going to wreak havoc on his hair.
</p><p>
“You’re immortal,” Patrick cues. 
</p><p>
“Yes.”
</p><p>
“What, like…. I have no frame of reference here.”
</p><p>
“Like, Stevie comes from old gods who cursed her family line to live down here among mortals while still being immortal themselves. It’s a whole… ancient gods punishment thing. I’m still not one hundred percent clear on the details?” 
</p><p>
Patrick nods. His hands are stuffed into his pockets and his shoulders hunched against the cold, or against what David’s telling him. 
</p><p>
“Anyway, once upon a time, Alexis went into the woods behind the inn, and I followed her, and we both got hit with the curse, so now we’re immortal, too.”
</p><p>
“Wait, back up. There’s a witch now?”
</p><p>
“No. Well, I don’t think so. It was like a ring of very old trees,” David gestures and he can almost see the ring around him. Another ghost haunting him: it follows them around, a weight around his neck. “And there was a bright light, and that was it.”
</p><p>
“And this is real. You’re not lying.”
</p><p>
“Oh, I wish I was.”
</p><p>
“When was this? How old are you? How old is Stevie?”
</p><p>
“Nineteen-fifteen. Um, I’d rather not say. And I don’t know.”
</p><p>
“Okay.”
</p><p>
David waits, but it seems like that’s all that Patrick has for now. Patrick squints up at the sky, against the snowflakes falling on his face. 
</p><p>
“Not a big fan of winter,” Patrick says out of nowhere. “I like spring. You know, when you feel the sun on your face for the first time in months?”
</p><p>
“Mm.”
</p><p>
“The first baseball practice of the season, when the ground is still frozen but starting to go soft under the sun, and you can take off your jacket for the first time. I think that’s my favorite day of the entire year.”
</p><p>
“I can’t say I can relate? It might surprise you to know that I’ve never played. But that does sound nice.”
</p><p>
“One hundred years of immortality and you’ve never played baseball?” Patrick teases, and then his face falls. “Sorry. Bad joke.”
</p><p>
The streets are silent around them. Even the sound of cars in the distance is muffled by the snow. 
</p><p>
“So why didn’t you want to tell me?” Patrick asks finally. 
</p><p>
“Would you have believed me?”
</p><p>
“I mean, not at first, but eventually I would’ve noticed. So….”
</p><p>
“Fine. I didn’t want to tell you because you’re going to leave.”
</p><p>
“I’m coming back. I <em>told </em>you that I’m coming back.”
</p><p>
“Okay, you might this time, but one day you won’t, and I just… I didn’t want to make that happen. Not yet.”
</p><p>
“What are you talking about?”
</p><p>
“I’m not going to age, Patrick.” David stops in front of the Apothecary. “I built this place with my dad, Johnny Rose. He was the best man I’ve ever known. Everyone said I was his spitting image, that I would be his double when I grew older, but that hasn’t happened because I look exactly the same right now as I did then. 
</p><p>
“I won’t get a single gray hair, or a wrinkle, or another freckle. And you will. You’ll get older by yourself. And that’s not the worst that can happen. You might get really sick or hurt and I won’t be able to do anything other than sit and watch and we’ll both <em>hate</em> me for that.” He swallows. “We didn’t know my mom was sick until it was too late. I don’t know if going through the clearing would’ve saved her; she didn’t want it. But when she --” He loses his words for a second and Patrick, sweetest, rubs his arm and waits. “She was dying, and my dad looked at me, and he <em>hated</em> me. I stood there like an idiot, a miracle, the one who let this happen to Alexis and me, and all I could do while the love of his life was in so much agony was watch.”
</p><p>
“Oh, David.”
</p><p>
“And then he left us not long after she did and Alexis went so quiet I was terrified of losing her too and I couldn’t make it stop; I couldn’t fix any of it. It was <em>the worst </em>year of my life, and I’ve had one longer than most.”
</p><p>
“David, I’m so sorry that happened. I’m so sorry. But all of us live with that risk.”
</p><p>
“Don’t tell me you could get hit by a car tomorrow. It’s not the same. I <em>will</em> have to watch you die, or leave. I’m a goddamn time capsule. I’m stuck in place, and one day you won’t want to be stuck with me anymore. One day you’ll realize that everyone around you is having families and growing old together and we won’t get that. You can, but I’ll still be me. I’ll still be this.”
</p><p>
“You can’t know that, David!”
</p><p>
“But I do! I do know that. I have a hundred years of my and Stevie’s and Alexis’s life experience telling me exactly that. All the three of us have is each other and one day you’re going to go and you’re not going to come back. It might be by choice or it might be because you're mortal but it <em>will</em> happen.”
</p><p>
“All those things happen normally, David,” Patrick pleads, his eyes wide and wet. “People leaving, people d-dying, those are things that everyone risks, all the time.”
</p><p>
“It’s different,” David whispers, shaking his head. “Our risks aren’t even comparable. You know, I broke my arm, falling off that ladder.”
</p><p>
Patrick stares at him and it’s like he’s looking at someone else and David feels with a sick drop of his stomach what Stevie’s been telling him all these years. 
</p><p>
“You what?”
</p><p>
“It healed by the time I went to bed.”
</p><p>
“You lied to me?”
</p><p>
“How could I not?” His voice echoes around the square before the snow swallows it up.
</p><p>
“You’ve been lying to me.”
</p><p>
“I had no choice, Patrick.”
</p><p>
“Don’t give me that,” Patrick says furiously. “Do not put this on me.”
</p><p>
David folds his arms and looks into his Apothecary, the place his dad built with him, the only testament he has left to what was his human life. He wonders what his dad would say now. He thinks his dad would’ve liked Patrick.
</p><p>
“And there’s no —“
</p><p>
“There’s no cure.” 
</p><p>
Patrick rubs a hand over his face and takes a step backwards. David tries to pull on a hopeful smile; he’s not sure if he manages.
</p><p>
“Don’t you want a life? A real life?”
</p><p>
“I want a life with <em>you</em>, David,” Patrick says, his voice breaking. David shakes his head and snowmelt drips from Patrick’s eyelashes. “Don’t I get a choice, here? What about what I want?”
</p><p>
“Do you think I want this? I want <em>you</em>! But that’s not an option for me.”
</p><p>
“It is!” Patrick insists, gripping David’s arms. “It is, David. Maybe it’s not ‘normal,’ or whatever, but what we have isn’t nothing.”
</p><p>
“Why?” he asks wearily. “Why would you even want this?”
</p><p>
Patrick looks at him with wet eyes, his face washed-out in the dim light of the Apothecary. 
</p><p>
“David, I just....” David bites his lip and Patrick rubs at his face. “God, I’m so tired. Can we go home and finish talking later?”
</p><p>
David nods and reaches out to touch Patrick’s shoulder automatically before dropping his hand. 
</p><p>
The walk back to the inn is quiet; the snow muffles the sound around them, but David’s nerves ring with each gentle gust of wind. 
</p><p>
Patrick stops in the hallway and pulls off his hat, his hair flat on the sides and sticking up in back, their coats dripping melted snow on the years-worn runners under their boots. 
</p><p>
“I think,” Patrick says. He rubs his top lip with his thumb. “I think I need some time.”
</p><p>
“Okay.”
</p><p>
“I might go back to school tomorrow.”
</p><p>
“Okay.”
</p><p>
“Just. David, I--”
</p><p>
“No, I get it. It’s fine.”
</p><p>
Patrick twists his hat in his hands. He smiles sadly up at David and goes into 4C, shutting the door behind him. 
</p><p>
Okay.
</p><p>
David doesn’t sleep. He lays awake for hours, staring out his window, checking his phone for messages that aren’t there, and around five in the morning he shoves out of bed in a huff. 
</p><p>
He pulls on fresh socks and his boots and still-damp coat and heads over to the town hall. One of Mutt’s projects had been to install a new back door because the lock opens if you shove it just right, and it never got done, because Mutt didn’t give a shit. David pushes the door open and the hall is dark and empty and silent, like it’s just waiting. Using his phone as a flashlight, he goes to the not-closet and up the steep creaking stairs and out to the back balcony.
</p><p>
The blanket and lantern are gone, because they were Patrick’s, but the cold can’t hurt him. He lays on his back in the snow and stares up at the thick dark clouds hanging so low it seems like he could reach out and touch them.
</p><p>
He didn’t do it right. He should’ve told Patrick earlier, differently. 
</p><p>
He never should’ve told him.
</p><p>
He never should’ve gotten involved with him. 
</p><p>
He keeps checking his phone, half-typing messages to Patrick: angry, pleading, desperate, bitter. He doesn’t send any of them. He can be the bigger person, or at least try. 
</p><p>
He types out another one: <em>maybe you should just stay at school</em>. He taps send before he lets himself think about it and then it’s done.
</p><p>
The sky slowly lightens above him, and he doesn’t move. His stomach growls and he thinks about maybe getting up to go to the cafe.
</p><p>
Eventually the door opens and Alexis says, “Ew, David, why are you laying in the snow like a seal?”
</p><p>
“Go away, Alexis.”
</p><p>
She does but comes back a minute later with a folding chair, which she sets in the snow next to him. When she sits on it, it rocks on uneven legs. She pulls her feet up to sit on it cross-legged and manages to balance it with a grace he’s never been able to emulate.
</p><p>
“What are you doing out here, David?” 
</p><p>
“Couldn’t sleep.”
</p><p>
“You told Patrick?”
</p><p>
“Yes.”
</p><p>
“And?”
</p><p>
He sits up with a sigh. 
</p><p>
“And he said he needs time.”
</p><p>
“Well, that seems fair.”
</p><p>
“I fucked up,” David whispers.
</p><p>
“Yeah,” she says gently. “Maybe.” She brushes snow out of his hair and he closes his eyes to the soft hush of her fingertips. “Did I ever tell you why Ted and I never dated?”
</p><p>
“I assumed it was because you didn’t want to.”
</p><p>
“Of course I wanted to. He’s sweet and smart and kind and I know he loves me. I think I could love him, too.”
</p><p>
She looks out at the snow-covered trees like she’s gazing right through them, and David’s reminded of that awful night in Montreal.
</p><p>
“He’s always wanted to do research. He loves learning and discovering new things and he cares so much about animals that just neutering puppies and delivering kittens was never going to be enough for him.”
</p><p>
“The fellowship?”
</p><p>
“I always knew that was coming. And he knew it, too. He didn’t care, at first, and I almost…”
</p><p>
David rubs her knee and she wipes at her nose. 
</p><p>
“You know what he said, once? He said, ‘It would be an honor to be with you for this chapter of your long life, Alexis Rose.’”
</p><p>
“What a dork,” he says, to make her smile, and she laughs wetly.
</p><p>
“He really is.”
</p><p>
“And you said no.”
</p><p>
“I don’t know if it was the right choice. I don’t know if there is a right choice. But here we are.”
</p><p>
“Are you okay?” he asks, his hand still on her knee. When she was a baby, her knees had dimples.
</p><p>
“I’m so happy for him. He’s going to get his dream job and he’s going to meet some other girl who can make him happier than I ever could. And I’m moving on on my own terms.”
</p><p>
“I admire you so much, did you know that?”
</p><p>
“Don’t,” she says, and her loose hair falls in front of her face as she ducks her head. “I was with Mutt because it was easy. <em>Because</em> we didn’t love each other. It’s fucked up. I think we fucked each other up.”
</p><p>
“As a third party and your brother, I feel qualified to say that I don’t think you’re fucked up. I mean, no more so than me and Stevie.”
</p><p>
“Thanks.”
</p><p>
They sit and listen to snow fall in clumps from tree boughs, knocked off by a gentle breeze.
</p><p>
“Hey.” He shakes her knee and she tucks her hair behind her ear to look down at him from her perch on the chair. “I’m hungry. Want to go get some pancakes?”
</p><p>
“You’re always hungry. But sure.”
</p><p>
“Don’t forget to bring in the chair.”
</p><p>
“Ugh, David.”
</p><p>
Stevie meets them in the cafe -- David suspects Alexis had texted her, but she acts like it’s a coincidence -- and steals a bite of perfectly-syruped pancakes from David’s plate before Twyla brings more for her. He swats her hand with his sticky fork but she just licks it off, unbothered.
</p><p>
“So I’ve done an informal poll and we’re looking good for the election,” Stevie says.
</p><p>
“That’s great,” Alexis says supportively and David makes agreement noises.
</p><p>
“We just need to rally people to come out and actually vote. So I was thinking we could have the town council have a nonpartisan get-out-the-vote event here in the cafe, maybe ask Twyla if we can promote a dollar off coffees for all voters.”
</p><p>
“I can help with that,” Alexis says, pulling Stevie’s notebook towards her. Stevie sighs and drops her pen onto the table for Alexis to use.
</p><p>
He tunes them out as they talk about the campaign and stares at his phone, unlocking it whenever the screen dims again.
</p><p>
<em>maybe you should just stay at school</em> sits at the end of the text thread, unanswered. Should he send another text? 
</p><p>
“Is Patrick coming for breakfast?” Stevie asks him, and he realizes that they’ve been staring at him.
</p><p>
“No. He, uh, he’s leaving for school today.”
</p><p>
“Oh. When is he supposed to be back? I can keep some of his stuff in storage, if he wants.”
</p><p>
A strangled breath escapes David’s throat and Stevie exchanges an alarmed look with Alexis.
</p><p>
“David?”
</p><p>
“No, he --” He clears his throat, switches off his phone’s display and drops it on the table. “I don’t think he’s coming back.”
</p><p>
“I thought you were going to talk to him!” Stevie hisses at Alexis, which is just fantastic.
</p><p>
“I did!”
</p><p>
“It’s fine,” he says firmly. “It’s done. Can we move on?”
</p><p>
“Oh, David.”
</p><p>
“Please.”
</p><p>
“Okay,” Stevie says, gentleness rasping her voice. 
</p><p>
Alexis uses a napkin to pick up the sticky-gross maple syrup dispenser and pours more syrup on top of David’s pancakes, he guesses as some kind of apology. She and Stevie smile at each other and he has the distinct sense that they’re playing footsie under the table.
</p><p>
“Seriously?”
</p><p>
“What?”
</p><p>
“I am in an emotional crisis and you’re <em>flirting</em> with each other right here in front of me?”
</p><p>
“David!” Alexis gasps, but he knows her pretend-shocked face. Stevie cringes.
</p><p>
“Sorry, David.”
</p><p>
“So this is how it’s going to go!” he continues shrilly. “I’m alone forever in abject misery and you two get to galavant off, happily ever after?”
</p><p>
“Guess so,” Stevie says with a shrug. 
</p><p>
“So when did this happen? <em>How</em> did it happen?”
</p><p>
“I don’t think you want the details,” she says, a disgustingly smug look on her face.
</p><p>
“Ew, please don’t tell me.”
</p><p>
“We might have had a really interesting conversation when we were picking apples,” Alexis says. She dips a finger in maple syrup on Stevie’s plate and licks it off with an eyebrow raised at Stevie.
</p><p>
“God, forget I asked.”
</p><p>
“You know, there’s something about shared life experience that’s really sexy, David.”
</p><p>
“Actually, I was already feeling really shitty, and this is emphatically not helping.”
</p><p>
“Come on, David,” Alexis says, tapping the table with her fingertip. “All you have to do is text Patrick and I’m sure you can fix it in like two seconds. He’s, like, embarrassingly into you.”
</p><p>
“I did text him.”
</p><p>
“And?”
</p><p>
“And I told him to stay at school.”
</p><p>
“Why would you do that?” Stevie asks, wrinkling her nose. 
</p><p>
“Because I’m trying to be the bigger person!”
</p><p>
“What did you say to him?” she asks Alexis.
</p><p>
“What -- I didn’t tell you to break up with him!”
</p><p>
“Okay, first of all, I sent the text before we talked, and it wasn’t a <em>break-up text</em>.”
</p><p>
“Sounds like it was,” Stevie mutters.
</p><p>
“And second of all, you absolutely did tell me to, like, let him go!”
</p><p>
“That was so not the point of the story!”
</p><p>
“Oh my god,” Stevie interrupts. “I knew I should have gone with you to talk to him.”
</p><p>
“Okay, this is not my fault,” Alexis says, waving her wrists.
</p><p>
“I wasn’t blaming you! Alright, maybe a little, but --”
</p><p>
“Ugh, you are so annoying sometimes.” Alexis moodily slouches back in the seat.
</p><p>
“Yeah. Luckily, I give really good head.”
</p><p>
“Oh my god,” David says. “What did I do to deserve this?”
</p><p>
“Whatever, David,” Alexis says, a little flustered. “Shouldn’t you be off making your third-act dramatic apology or something?”
</p><p>
“What?”
</p><p>
“Well, you love Patrick, right?”
</p><p>
“It's been like a month,” he says, crooking his jaw. She raises her eyebrows at him, further evidence that the true drawback to immortality is never being able to get away with anything because she knows him too well.
</p><p>
“Whatever. It’s your life.”
</p><p>
“And this has been entirely unhelpful,” David says and slides out of the booth. He points at them and pulls his eyebrows together. “You two are paying for breakfast, by the way.”
</p><p>
“David!”
</p><p>
Overnight, the inn has transformed from leaf-strewn framed by shedding trees into a picture straight out of a Hallmark Christmas movie in the fresh early-season snow. He expects it to be silent inside, but he can hear the faint sounds of guests moving around in their rooms; there’s a pair of kids somewhere yelling happily about making a snowman, their exasperated parents’ murmurs following them. From the sound of it through the door, someone in 2A is actually watching a Hallmark Christmas movie.
</p><p>
He ignores it all and massages his sternum to try to keep his heart from throbbing out of his chest. 
</p><p>
If Patrick is still -- 
</p><p>
If he hasn’t left yet --
</p><p>
He can fix this. He’s going to just knock on the door and Patrick will say, “Come in!” like he has so many times before and David will walk in and Patrick will look at him with those big brown eyes and David will say, “Stay,” and Patrick will say, “Okay,” and then they’ll have some really nice, almost uncomfortably intimate I’m-sorry sex.
</p><p>
Outside Patrick’s room, he takes a minute to steel himself until he’s breathing deeply and evenly and makes sure that his hair is all in place. 
</p><p>
He knocks on the door to 4C and tentatively calls Patrick’s name.
</p><p>
He can’t hear a response, so he tests the doorknob and shoulders the door open. 
</p><p>
It’s empty and dark. He flips on the light and everything of Patrick’s is gone: his piles of research, his laptop, the pinned notes from his mom, the suit from the AppleFest Hop that he’d left hanging on his closet door. 
</p><p>
David tugs open one of the dresser drawers and that’s empty, too. It’s all empty. David’s too late, again; not enough, again; the room still smells like Patrick and he wraps an arm around his waist, wishing it were his, needing him steady and solid and smiling and <em>here</em>. He presses his knuckles to his mouth and squeezes his eyes shut, like that’ll keep in the devastation flooding his chest, the self-loathing clawing its way up his throat.
</p><p>
He <em>hates</em> himself, both this thing inside him that keeps him stuck in this body and the part of being David that just makes it so easy for people to leave. Patrick will get to have his own life and be loved by someone better, and David will be here, still this, still alone without him.
</p><p>
On the neatly-made bed is a small pile of meticulously-folded clothing and other things: David’s clothes that he’d left in Patrick’s room over the past few weeks. His spare phone charger. His nighttime moisturizer. The cufflinks he’d worn to the Hop, carefully centered on top of his folded sleep shirt.
</p><p>
His hands shaking, vision blurred, David gathers it all, shuts the door to 4C behind him, and drops it in a jumble on the settee in his room. He climbs into bed.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Maple Season</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
The spring comes slowly to Schitt’s Creek. Snow keeps falling in six-inch increments; it feels like they barely finish shoveling out the inn before there’s another storm in the forecast. 
</p>
<p>
David spends most of his time in the Apothecary. He recruits Alexis to help him put on events to help boost his sales during the winter months, and takes advantage of the excuse to stay long hours away from the inn. When his store is full of townspeople, sudden and loud and bright, he lets Alexis lead the events and stays out of the way behind the register. It's easier to forget the time passing when he's alone in his store, rearranging and planning and putting together his events, when the town is cold and dark and quiet outside his windows. A few times he stays so late that he's too tired to fight his way back to the inn through the accumulating snow and sleeps on the air mattress he starts keeping in the back room, but he tries to make it home often enough to avoid Stevie and Alexis's worried looks.
</p>
<p>
When the sun comes out, he tilts his head up and closes his eyes and feels its warmth on his face. He thinks of Patrick.
</p>
<p>
At first, he can’t get him out of his head. Sometimes when he’s in the store he’ll turn and half-expect to see Patrick smiling and waiting for him to go for dinner, or at the inn he’ll think about Patrick diligently doing his schoolwork over in 4C before remembering that he’s not. 
</p>
<p>
It takes a while before he figures out that a stack of two pillows folded the right way will approximate Patrick’s shoulder under his head when he’s trying to fall asleep. It’s not the same, but it’s enough for the circles under his eyes to stop showing up in the morning.
</p>
<p>
Conversations half-start in his head, or he’ll file something away to tease Patrick about later, and it feels like something in him is dying while at the same time the image of Patrick he has in his head keeps living, no matter how hard he tries to shove other things in front of it.
</p>
<p>
But Stevie and Alexis drag him to the cafe for meals and show up to hang out at the Apothecary, sometimes bugging the hell out of him, sometimes just being there to force him to be in the same space with them. They’ll chat with just each other if he’s in a quiet mood, but they’re still there when he turns around, looking for them. 
</p>
<p>
One day in late February the sun comes out and the temperature isn’t at unbearable tundra levels and, without really thinking about it, he walks out behind the inn and heads deep into the woods for the first time in years, if not decades. The forest floor has been spared most of the snow, still hanging overhead on tree branches, melting under the new sun. Frozen leaves and twigs crackle under his feet as he walks in the general direction of the clearing, making his way by some memory deep in his bones gently reeling him in. 
</p>
<p>
An owl hoots somewhere nearby, but all the other birds are surely still south for the winter, so he jumps when he hears a sudden skittering: a squirrel darting across a pile of leaves, just as startled by him as he is by it. 
</p>
<p>
He strides towards the break in the trees ahead, cold sunshine streaming in, and bursts out into the clearing. There’s no flash of light this time. In the distance, a tawny rabbit sniffs hopefully at a bed of pine needles.
</p>
<p>
“So there’s really no undoing this,” he says out loud, the trees old and silent in their ring around him. “You’re just going to let me suffer.”
</p>
<p>
A drop of snowmelt falls from one of the trees onto one of the broad dark leaves on the ground. 
</p>
<p>
“He was <em>perfect</em>,” he whispers, his voice cracking. The bare trees stand resolute. 
</p>
<p>
He steps on a branch that cracks under his foot and a bird takes off; he guesses they’re not all gone, after all. He stands there listening to the snow slowly melt under the sun and breathes in the clean dirt smell of the snow and leaves, an oxymoron fitting of white snow dotted with tree-bits. 
</p>
<p>
“Can you just fix this? Please?” He sniffs and wipes at his nose with the back of his hand. There’s no response, of course, but he feels marginally better, like something’s been settled. “Great. Thanks.”
</p>
<p>
One of his vendors drops off some bright yellow daffodils at the Apothecary and David would normally sell them for a decent markup but ends up taking them home this time, for reasons he doesn’t think about.
</p>
<p>
They look nice in his room, though: cheerful bursts of sunshine on his windowsill and desk when everything is still so gloomy.
</p>
<p>
But clearly the fates are still out to get him, because even when it’s March in Canada it’s not appropriately grey and cloudy outside his window when he wants it to be, which really puts a damper on his moping. He resigns himself to eating the last of the Butani honeycrisp apples, cut into slices and topped with an almost unreasonable amount of peanut butter, reading a book and pretending that the sun isn’t shining outside.
</p>
<p>
Stevie knocks on his door and walks right in on him stuffing an entire slice into his mouth. He nearly chokes and while his mouth is still full she starts talking.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, David, it’s been months and this is just sad,” she says, her hands on her hips. 
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” he says around his mouthful of apple and peanut butter.
</p>
<p>
“Have you even tried to call him?”
</p>
<p>
He finally swallows. “I sent the last text. It’s his turn to reach out to me if he wants to.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god. You are actually the dumbest person I have ever met.”
</p>
<p>
“Thanks.”
</p>
<p>
She steals one of the last slices, ignoring his protest, and sits cross-legged on his bed.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, for -- take your shoes off, at least,” he says weakly. She ignores this too.
</p>
<p>
"In case you didn't realize, today's the Spring Fling."
</p>
<p>
"Mm." 
</p>
<p>
“Alexis has put a lot of work into organizing it this year and it would mean a lot to her if you would show up.”
</p>
<p>
“Fine.” He can get there after the festival’s traditional baseball game and stuff some maple candy into his pockets and then come back here to eat it while finishing his book. 
</p>
<p>
“So you’re coming to the game today. And you’re going to talk to me and Alexis and smile at least once.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re downright tyrannical.”
</p>
<p>
“You have to start living again, David. You’re going to be okay,” Stevie says softly. 
</p>
<p>
He sighs and rolls onto his back. “When, though?”
</p>
<p>
“You’ve got time,” she says, cracking a smile. “He doesn’t, though. So you might want to get on that before he goes all grey and flabby.”
</p>
<p>
“He’s not going to get grey and flabby,” David says grumpily. “He’s going to be silver and distinguished and one of those frustrating people who gets to keep their athleticism forever. I’ll have the face and body of someone who’s basically twenty-nine and he’ll still look better than me.”
</p>
<p>
He gracefully ignores the eyeroll she gives him.
</p>
<p>
“Get your shit together. Call him. Get out of your room and come to the Spring Fling game this afternoon.”
</p>
<p>
“Wha-- I go places! We had a wine tasting event at the Apothecary just last week and I’m pretty sure you drank two entire bottles by yourself. And baseball is Patrick’s thing,” he adds somewhat pathetically.
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, David. Go support your sister. I will see you there or I will sic the Brady twins on you.”
</p>
<p>
He sighs but the horrifying thought of having to entertain the two very energetic ten-year-old twin boys staying on the second floor, whose parents are always trying to wheedle someone into babysitting, is enough to get him up and dressed.
</p>
<p>
He stops by the town hall on the way to the baseball field, goes in the back way through the door with the lock still broken, and up the stairs as quietly as possible so as to not have the council meeting in the main room hear him. He’s not sure he could explain himself.
</p>
<p>
Most of the snow on the roof deck has melted under the sun, except for small patches shaded by the trees around the building. 
</p>
<p>
He stands in the sun and wraps an arm around himself when a cold breeze comes through, rustling the bare branches that reach up to the sky around him. He breathes in the town below.
</p>
<p>
<em>maybe you should just stay at school</em>, timestamped back in October, stares up at him from his phone.
</p>
<p>
He bites his lip and dials. It rings out and goes to voicemail, which is probably for the best.
</p>
<p>
“Hi, Patrick, it’s David. I hope Ken isn’t driving you into the ground with your thesis. Um. I don’t know if you -- if you want to hear from me. But, um. Please call me? Please. This is David Rose. Bye.”
</p>
<p>
He hangs up and drops his head back; it’s done. It’s done it’s done it’s done, and now he can tell Stevie that it’s done, and she’ll stop bugging him, and oh fuck. He redials.
</p>
<p>
“Hi. Um. Just realized what the last voicemail message might have sounded like and it’s not urgent. No emergency. Okay. Bye. Oh, it’s David again. Bye.”
</p>
<p>
He hangs up again, stares at his phone, and mutters, “Oh my god,” under his breath. “That’s not humiliating at all.”
</p>
<p>
Well. Whatever. Either Patrick will call him back or he won’t, he tells himself, and tries to believe it. He’s known her too long to assume that Stevie won’t follow through on her threat to subjugate him to babysitting duties, so he needs to get going to the Spring Fling. Maybe it’ll be enough to distract him for a few hours.
</p>
<p>
Most years he looks forward to it: there’s a baseball game which he ignores and all the local maple farms bring their first batches of syrup, candies, and baked goods of the season -- taste tests of syrup grades, hard maple candies, soft maple candies, maple cotton candy, maple tea stirrers, maple honey, maple ice cream, maple scones, maple donuts.... If there’s been a fresh snowfall, they sometimes even have maple sugar on snow, which in his opinion is the only worthwhile part of the last weeks of endless snowfall that otherwise drag on. 
</p>
<p>
Unfortunately his luck is shit: he comes back down the stairs right when the council meeting is ending and they’re in the back room collecting their coats and hats, and there’s no way to avoid them.
</p>
<p>
“David!” Vidya says happily. The mayorship suits her and she pulls off a power blazer better than even David's mother could. “Are you going to head over to the Spring Fling with us?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, you go on ahead.”
</p>
<p>
“Nonsense. Walk over to the Spring Fling with the mayor,” she says with a wink, leading him outside by the arm with the rest of the council trailing behind them. “Let me tell you, your Patrick has been a huge help in putting together our community calendar this year.”
</p>
<p>
“Has he really,” David manages.
</p>
<p>
“Really! Oh, he had nothing but praise for the AppleFest and he recommended we prop up the Lee Maple Farm the same way we do the Orchard, so he’s the one to thank for the expanded Spring Fling this year.”
</p>
<p>
“Really?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes!” She shakes him enthusiastically, one arm around his shoulders. “And of course the Lees are more than happy to chart the springtime course with the maple farm. Now, I know you’ve had your troubles with apple picking, but we thought that maybe a DIY sugar on snow stand would be right up your alley.”
</p>
<p>
“Uh, yeah.” Wait -- “We?”
</p>
<p>
“Patrick and I! And the council, but between you and me, they’re a bunch of pushovers. Thank god for your sister putting it all together; I don’t know how we would manage any of it without her.”
</p>
<p>
“Wow,” he says weakly.
</p>
<p>
“You know, I’m proud of you, too.”
</p>
<p>
“How so?”
</p>
<p>
“All the events you’ve been putting on at the Apothecary the last few months! What I love about this town is how much everyone cares about each other, and you kept us all getting together and having fun over the winter! No post-holiday drag for Schitt’s Creek, no sir.”
</p>
<p>
“Well….”
</p>
<p>
“Of course, you brought in a nice chunk of revenue for the town, but I can’t really go around saying that,” she adds sotto voce. 
</p>
<p>
“You don’t say.”
</p>
<p>
“I do indeed. Surely you noticed that we still have tourists at the inn even though it’s the time of year most people hop on down to Florida?”
</p>
<p>
“I - I guess?” He looks around the baseball grounds, hoping to find some kind of savior to get him out of this conversation.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, I’ll cure you of that modesty one day, David Rose.”
</p>
<p>
“Did you just call him modest?” Stevie interrupts. David whips around and widens his eyes at her: <em>save me</em>. She just smirks. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone call him that in the last hundred years.”
</p>
<p>
“You two!” Vidya says cheerfully. She finally lets David go. “Enjoy yourselves, alright? Tell Alexis I’ll be around if she needs me for anything.”
</p>
<p>
“Will do,” Stevie says seriously.
</p>
<p>
“Oh thank god,” David breathes once Vidya’s off chatting with someone else.
</p>
<p>
“So you showed.”
</p>
<p>
“Here I am, dutifully supporting my sister at the hundredth Spring Fling she’s put on.”
</p>
<p>
“Did you call Patrick?”
</p>
<p>
“I did.”
</p>
<p>
“And?”
</p>
<p>
“And I left a voicemail.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, what was I supposed to do?”
</p>
<p>
“Tell me you at least didn’t tell him you love him in a voicemail.”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t think so?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” she repeats.
</p>
<p>
He plays it over in his head and cringes.
</p>
<p>
“Honestly, it was awkward in about five different ways and I hope he never listens to it and I hope you’re happy for making me do it.”
</p>
<p>
“Ecstatic. Can we go watch the baseball game now?”
</p>
<p>
“If we must.”
</p>
<p>
David follows her to the stands, looking longingly over his shoulder at the maple snacks and sugar on snow stands still being set up.
</p>
<p>
His boots squish into the sun-thawed muddy grass and he pulls out his sunglasses, the ones Patrick liked, and puts them on to try to hide his face from Stevie.
</p>
<p>
Alexis is waiting for them in the stands and Stevie slides over first before David, who gives the dusty aluminum bench a skeptical look.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t think that this has ever been cleaned.”
</p>
<p>
“Just sit, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Ugh.” He gingerly wipes off as much of the dirt and dust as he can with his hand, which he then cringes at. “Why are we here?”
</p>
<p>
“Community pride, David,” Alexis says firmly. “Also, you love us and enjoy hanging out with us.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, that’s debatable.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m glad that you’re here.” 
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
“No, I mean it, David. It’s nice to see your face outside of the inn or the store.”
</p>
<p>
“I also go to the cafe,” he argues uselessly. She gives him a pitying look. “Okay, not all of us can find somebody to date who is also an immortal! Unless Stevie is hiding some tinder for the undying that we don’t know about?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, did I forget to tell you about that? There are loads of eligible single immortal people just waiting for you to swipe right.”
</p>
<p>
“I’ll take that as a no,” David says drily. She shrugs and Alexis tweaks her hat. 
</p>
<p>
Over the years, the time he alone knew Alexis will be negligible next to the time Stevie has known her. One day, they’ll be closer with each other than either are with him. They won’t be the three of them anymore; they’ll be the two of them plus David. Bitter jealousy twists his stomach and he tries to focus on the baseball instead.
</p>
<p>
He sticks it out through the first couple of rounds of the game, barely noticing when the teams change out. He tries his best not to picture what Patrick would be like in his little outfit, out on the field. Considering that he’s just as competitive as David is, it probably would even be fun to watch.
</p>
<p>
After about an hour, though, the semi-pleasant weather gives way to a cold, drizzly rain and while the rest of the crowd seems determined to sit through this dull hell David truly cannot. Some of them are wearing <em>plastic ponchos</em>.
</p>
<p>
“I can’t do this,” he says. 
</p>
<p>
“Well, why didn’t you bring an umbrella?” Alexis asks, huddled together with Stevie under a big red umbrella that is frankly dripping down David’s collar.
</p>
<p>
“No, not -- whatever. I’m going. Can you bring me back some maple stuff?”
</p>
<p>
“Like what?”
</p>
<p>
“I don’t know! Whatever they have. Use your best judgment. I’m going back to the inn.”
</p>
<p>
Stevie twists her mouth sadly at him and he tries to smile back. Alexis has woven half a braid into Stevie’s hair and he’s not sure if she hasn’t noticed or doesn’t care. 
</p>
<p>
His hair is starting to drip into his eyes, his feet are uncomfortably wet, his clothes are half ruined, and he really wishes he’d stayed back in his room, Brady twins or no. 
</p>
<p>
Actually, no. This is probably still better than having to babysit.
</p>
<p>
He slides out of the bleachers and cuts across the adjacent field, a shortcut to the main drag that will take him to the inn. Behind him, a cheer builds through the crowd at something with the baseball game, and he tries not to think about the maple treats he’s walking away from. He’s placed a big order with Lees' Maple Farm for the Apothecary anyway and there’s always an opportunity to sample the product at some point. 
</p>
<p>
He’s going to go back to his room with his old familiar settee and the old familiar book and fresh bright daffodils and he’s going to be <em>fine</em>.
</p>
<p>
As he crosses the field the rain fades to just a cold misting, which is nice except that he’s already wet and a full-on downpour would suit his mood better. He allows himself the bitterness for now.
</p>
<p>
Some of the trees on the edge of the field have reddish branches, and after a moment he realizes that those are buds coming through: spring come to Schitt’s Creek at last. It’s nice to see, really, even though there’s rainwater dripping down the back of his favorite spring jacket.
</p>
<p>
Of course, despite the thick lugs on the sole, his boot gets sucked into a patch of mud in the field. He swears at it and seriously regrets his decision to try to take the quickest way home. When he finally pulls it free, he looks up to see a dark figure approaching through the misting rain from across the far side of the field. 
</p>
<p>
The gait is very familiar and it stops him where he’s standing, surer than the mud, his mouth dry, his heart beating flicker-fast. 
</p>
<p>
He pushes his hair off his forehead and it limps to the side, dripping, but he can’t even process what he must look like, can’t even think about it.
</p>
<p>
The figure draws closer and he can make out the forest green raincoat’s hood flopping with each step, the tremble of his thighs as he pushes through the deepening mud, and finally the determined set of his mouth.
</p>
<p>
David blinks rainwater out of his eyes. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick strides closer and in one motion, one hand on David’s neck, pulls him in for a searing kiss, bruising, his fingers digging into the back of David’s head.
</p>
<p>
He tastes of stale coffee and pretzels and just wonderful delicious Patrick, and David might be crying or it might just be rain on his face but it’s a little gross and the single best thing he’s ever tasted. 
</p>
<p>
His hand is on Patrick’s face, his soft cheek, the miraculous stubborn curve of his jaw under David's fingers, opening for him, his mouth slick with rain and tears and saliva and there’s nothing better.
</p>
<p>
His heart stutters, he inhales, the first crisp breath he’s had since the fall, a breath shared with Patrick, who carefully fingers the swoop of David’s hair out of his face and kisses him again like he can’t bear not to.
</p>
<p>
When finally he needs to take a real breath Patrick only lets him go as far as their noses touching, lungs hitching with the sobs he’s been holding in for months.
</p>
<p>
“David, I --”
</p>
<p>
“Hi.”
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says helplessly, his hands still on David’s face, rain dripping off his eyelashes. “Sorry, I just --”
</p>
<p>
“Did you get my voicemails?” David blurts, his mouth and brain still not connected. 
</p>
<p>
“I -- no, I’ve been driving. You left me voicemails?”
</p>
<p>
“You can just delete them,” David whispers through his blissed-out smile. 
</p>
<p>
“Oh no, I won't be doing that.”
</p>
<p>
“How are you <em>here</em>?”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve, uh, I’ve been talking with Vidya about the Spring Fling and some ideas I had for community engagement and I knew it was today and I just. I knew it was raining and you might not be here but I just couldn’t not try to see you, I can’t stand it, it’s just been awful --”
</p>
<p>
“I know,” David interrupts. “I know, it’s the worst.”
</p>
<p>
“God, I missed you so much.”
</p>
<p>
“Um. Not that I don’t love this -- seriously, top five most romantic things that have ever happened to me -- but it’s raining.”
</p>
<p>
“It is,” Patrick says, his eyes sparkling. “Top five, huh?”
</p>
<p>
“Tell me your car is parked somewhere nearby and I’ll bump you up to top three.”
</p>
<p>
“Deal.” Patrick pulls a collapsible umbrella from the deep pocket of his raincoat and if David hadn’t already fallen for him this would’ve done it. Patrick shakes it out and holds it up over David’s head and David’s eyes well with a fresh rush of tears. “Hey, hey,” Patrick says, concerned.
</p>
<p>
“Top two,” David tells him, his voice hushed with emotion. Patrick gets it, though, and his smile grows blinding.
</p>
<p>
“Only the top two?”
</p>
<p>
“I can’t let your ego get any bigger than it already is.”
</p>
<p>
“Understood.”
</p>
<p>
David’s room is just how he’d left it, a little stuffy and gloomy save for the bursts of yellow daffodils, and he wants to open the windows to air it out but the rain is falling thicker so instead he just shucks his coat and hangs it up on the back of his door with Patrick’s.
</p>
<p>
They stare at each other, hair dripping, David’s pants sticking to him uncomfortably.
</p>
<p>
“Um. I’d really like to change.”
</p>
<p>
“Right. Of course. I’ll just --”
</p>
<p>
“Do you want to borrow something?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh,” Patrick says, surprised. “Yeah, thanks.”
</p>
<p>
David nods and pulls out a loose navy tee and some grey sweatpants for Patrick to change into and a black tee and pajama pants for himself. He never used to own clothes like these.
</p>
<p>
Patrick sits on the edge of his bed, his hands folded between his knees, and David’s anxiety grows. 
</p>
<p>
“So,” Patrick begins. “Can you, um. Can you sit?” David nods and sits next to him, maybe a little too close but the proximity helps quiet the frantic turning of his brain. “Um. When you texted me… that, I just packed up and left and I wish I hadn’t and I’m sorry I reacted like that. But, David....”
</p>
<p>
“I never meant for you to leave,” David says in a rush. “I mean, I thought I did, but I really… I wanted you to stay.” He takes a deep breath. “I want you to stay.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” Patrick says, and a smile flickers across his face. “Even though I’m not like you? I mean, you weren't wrong, and I hate the thought that I'll have to l-leave you." Patrick's voice catching trips David's tears and Patrick rubs his thigh. "But David, I really think -- I really think we could be great, and we have <em>time</em>. We can have time.”
</p>
<p>
“I love you,” David says, hushed like it’s a secret even though it’s not. Patrick’s eyes well up, shining brown, and David presses his mouth to Patrick’s shoulder, more connection than kiss.
</p>
<p>
“I love you, too.”
</p>
<p>
“One day with you made me happier than a hundred without you and I keep thinking that I just threw away four months with you like it was nothing and it was <em>awful</em> and I’m so sorry --”
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says, carding a hand through David’s hair, and David breathes. He holds onto Patrick’s shoulder and he’s starting to feel grounded again, like he’s more substance than air for the first time in months. But.
</p>
<p>
“Are you sure you want this, though?” he has to ask. “Like, sure-sure?”
</p>
<p>
“I’ve had some time to think about it,” Patrick says slowly, “and I get what you were telling me, I think, about why you hid what you -- what you are. I just.” He huffs and rubs his forehead with the heel of his palm. “I just disagree with your premise.”
</p>
<p>
“And what’s that?”
</p>
<p>
“That you’re stuck in time or -- or whatever. David. You’re not unchanging.”
</p>
<p>
“Um, I think that by definition I am.”
</p>
<p>
“I mean, your face maybe, but.” Patrick turns to face him and his palm on David’s face keeps David from ducking his gaze. “You’re a person. You grow and change like all the rest of us, and yeah you’re beautiful, but that’s not why I love you.” David feels his eyes welling up again and bites his lip. “You’re just,” he kisses David’s cheek, “an incredible,” his jaw, “incredible human,” his mouth.
</p>
<p>
David kisses him back; of course he does. Patrick is real and warm and <em>here</em> and finally the weather outside is giving him the gloomy rain he’s been wanting but in his room it’s bright and cozy, and the daffodils pale in comparison to the smile on Patrick’s face and the glow in David’s chest.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Out of the Woods</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <h3>Six months later </h3>
<p>
“Why are we doing this, again?” David asks, perched on the Apothecary’s register counter, trying not to overreact to the imminent destruction of his store. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick is standing between his legs, hands comfortingly broad on David’s knees, but it helps David’s anxiety only a little. His antique breakfront that’s normally at the back wall is safely in the back room, but his poor store is all drop-sheeted and he’s already itchy at the thought of all that dust all over the place.
</p>
<p>
“Because it’s been a hundred years, David,” Alexis says. “And that’s when you’re supposed to open a time capsule.” She adjusts her safety goggles, frowning. “Are these really necessary?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes,” Patrick says firmly. “I don’t care if you can’t get permanently blinded by debris; I don’t want to see splinters in anybody’s eyeball.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, fine!”
</p>
<p>
“Alright, who’s going first?” Stevie asks. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick looks at David, eyebrows raised.
</p>
<p>
“Guess I’ll go,” David says with a nervous laugh. “Um, are my goggles straight?”
</p>
<p>
“You look fine. Okay, pick up the sledgehammer.”
</p>
<p>
“Are we sure, though? My wall --”
</p>
<p>
“Will be rebuilt.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” David sighs. “Gimme the thing.” 
</p>
<p>
Patrick hands him the sledgehammer and even though David is expecting it to be heavy it’s still heavier. He walks it over to the back wall approximately where he remembers the builders putting the time capsule when he and his dad were building the store. Patrick hovers annoyingly behind him.
</p>
<p>
“I can do it!”
</p>
<p>
“Sorry.”
</p>
<p>
“Do I just --”
</p>
<p>
“Just pick it up and swing as hard as you can.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
A bit of a grunt escapes his mouth as he picks it up over his shoulder with both hands. He breathes out and in and then on the exhale he swings it as hard as he can against the wall, which cracks.
</p>
<p>
“Oh!”
</p>
<p>
“Nice, David!”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, my turn!” Alexis chirps. She pulls David out of the way with two fingers on his shoulder and takes the sledgehammer with little hums. 
</p>
<p>
When she hits the wall, there’s a real hole starting to form, and despite himself David starts to get a little excited.
</p>
<p>
“Can I go?” Stevie asks, and Alexis hands over the sledgehammer. Stevie swings and enlarges the hole, sending dust in a big cloud across David’s formerly-pristine floors. “Oh, that is fun,” she says, a little too awed for David’s comfort.
</p>
<p>
“Can you see it?” David asks, peering over her shoulder. 
</p>
<p>
“I see something.”
</p>
<p>
“Let me?”
</p>
<p>
She moves aside and he goes to reach into the wall but can’t shake the fear that something may be <em>living</em> in there.
</p>
<p>
“You do it,” he tells Patrick with a wave of his hand. Patrick salutes and shines his flashlight into the wall. 
</p>
<p>
“Yup, I see it.” 
</p>
<p>
He reaches his arm into the hole and with his brows pulled together he manages to pull out a small wooden chest, which he hands to David.
</p>
<p>
He’d forgotten until now that it’s in his hands that his dad had had made a little brass nameplate, now dirty brown with age, that reads: 
</p>
<p>
JOHNNY ROSE
</p>
<p>
MOIRA ROSE
</p>
<p>
DAVID ROSE
</p>
<p>
ALEXIS ROSE
</p>
<p>
THE ROSE APOTHECARY
</p>
<p>
1916-
</p>
<p>
The box isn’t even open yet and he’s twisting his mouth to hold back the wave of emotion. He can vividly see in his memory his dad handing him the box for his approval, the gentle smile, the thick eyebrows wilder than on David’s own face but once just as familiar.
</p>
<p>
He sets the box on one of his plastic-sheeted tables for them to gather around and feels like he should say something; a prayer, maybe, but he doesn’t remember any.
</p>
<p>
Patrick presses his shoulder to David’s on one side and Alexis leans against him on the other and, bracketed like this, he feels bolstered enough to look at it straight on, albeit through damp eyes.
</p>
<p>
“Do you remember this?” he asks Alexis through the lump in his throat.
</p>
<p>
“Vaguely,” she says, gripping his arm. “Didn’t Dad make a big deal about having it made locally?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, yes. The wood is from the trees out behind the inn,” he tells Patrick.
</p>
<p>
“And it was made by…” Alexis prompts, grinning. She pokes his arm and he rolls his eyes.
</p>
<p>
“By Stephen, who was kind of into me until he ditched me for that elephant trainer.”
</p>
<p>
“That’s right!” Stevie says. “You and he were…” She makes a vague hand gesture.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, we don’t need the play-by-play,” David interrupts.
</p>
<p>
“Wow,” Patrick mouths.
</p>
<p>
“Anyway! Let’s do this. Okay. How do we open this thing?”
</p>
<p>
“There’s a latch --”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.” He undoes the rusted latch and gingerly pushes open the hinged lid. 
</p>
<p>
He carefully lifts out first a photograph of their family, the four Roses plus Stevie.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t remember this,” Alexis says, hooking her chin over David’s shoulder. 
</p>
<p>
“I do,” Stevie says. “This was after you guys had been here for a year and your dad was helping me turn the boarding house into an inn. Remember, we had Roland take the photo and he kept trying to direct us to point at things?”
</p>
<p>
“Roland the mayor?” Patrick asks.
</p>
<p>
“And Mutt’s great-grandfather,” David says. “God, what a character.” 
</p>
<p>
“The exact opposite of our dad in every way and yet they were, like, best friends,” Alexis adds.
</p>
<p>
“We should frame this.”
</p>
<p>
“Ooh, and this, David.” Alexis pulls one of Moira’s headshots from the box next. She turns it over and his mother’s autograph is scrawled across the back along with <em>Kisses!</em> He laughs and <em>misses</em> her.
</p>
<p>
“Talk about a character,” Stevie says under her breath.
</p>
<p>
“She was incredible,” David tells Patrick. Patrick squeezes his shoulder and touches his forehead to David’s temple.
</p>
<p>
Next is a small paper envelope; Alexis tips it and a bracelet falls out. She laughs, tinkling and surprised.
</p>
<p>
“My tennis bracelet! Dad gave it to me for my sixteenth birthday.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s pretty,” Stevie says.
</p>
<p>
“I was so disappointed to get it,” Alexis says, smiling sadly. “I think I just put whatever jewelry I liked least in here because he wouldn’t stop bugging me about it. Oh, Dad.”
</p>
<p>
Stevie holds out her hand and Alexis drops the bracelet into her palm; Stevie gently takes Alexis’s wrist and, tongue between her teeth, fastens the bracelet on. Alexis laces their fingers together and presses a kiss to the back of Stevie’s hand and David just feels very very glad.
</p>
<p>
And then Stevie sneezes, a tiny high-pitched thing, and David gapes.
</p>
<p>
“Was that a sneeze?”
</p>
<p>
“It’s dusty in here!”
</p>
<p>
“That was the daintiest sneeze I have <em>ever</em> heard.”
</p>
<p>
“Shut up.”
</p>
<p>
“It was so cute,” Alexis says, tugging gently on a lock of Stevie’s hair.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, can we move on please?”
</p>
<p>
“It looks like next up is… a book? A diary?” Patrick guesses, lifting a black leather-bound A5 book. Alexis gasps.
</p>
<p>
“David’s journal!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god,” David says blankly. 
</p>
<p>
“Your what now?” Patrick asks, amused.
</p>
<p>
“Nothing.”
</p>
<p>
“No, I want to see.”
</p>
<p>
“I -- fine.” He waves Patrick on to open it. Patrick gently pulls the cover back, trying not to break it in its aged stiffness. “I don’t even know what I wrote in it.”
</p>
<p>
“<em>September 15th, 1914</em>,” Patrick reads from a random page. “<em>We have been staying at this godforsaken town for a week now and I am ready to hitch a ride with the next cow farmer passing through</em>.”
</p>
<p>
“It was a difficult time.”
</p>
<p>
“<em>I now know far too much about my parents’ private relationship and Alexis is liable to drive me mad</em>,” he continues. “Yikes. <em>I might, at a push, be convinced to take the Stevie girl with me</em>.”
</p>
<p>
“A little presumptuous,” Stevie says, wrinkling her nose. 
</p>
<p>
“God, you were such a drama queen,” Alexis says, and peers into the box. “Here is… a framed piece of paper? What is this?”
</p>
<p>
“The first receipt from the store,” David says slowly. “Dad must have kept it.” He pulls it out of her hands, ignoring her protest, and stares at it. The ink is very faded, but since it’s been in the box all this time it hasn’t been sun-damaged or anything.
</p>
<p>
“It looks like this is the last one,” Stevie says, holding up an envelope. Alexis takes it from her and pulls out two folded papers; one with her name on it in script and one with David’s.
</p>
<p>
He and Alexis exchange glances and he skims his letter silently, wanting to keep it private, at least for a moment. He almost doesn’t want to know what it says, so he skips through it only picking up a word here and there until he reaches the end, and then he has to reread it all the way through.
</p>
<p>
<em>My beloved son</em>, it says, <em>By the time you read this, I will be long gone, but you tell me you will still be around. I still can’t quite wrap my head around that, but if true then I hope for a few things. First, that you and Alexis have held onto each other for all those years. You may not always get along but she adores and admires you and you have both grown so much together in our time here in Schitt’s Creek. It might be lonely living so long after we’re gone but it’s a comfort to me that you will have your sister with you. Second, that you are happy and healthy and whole in every way that matters. Third, that you know just how proud I am of you. We had wealth and connections but when we lost them you stepped up and you helped to make this place a home for our family. I could not be more proud to call you my son and that will never change, no matter how old you get. Your mother and I love you both very much, but if we have done our job right you already know that. All my love, your father, Jonathan Rose</em>.
</p>
<p>
When he finishes reading he looks up at Alexis, her face just as soppy as his feels, and he holds out his arm for her to take. She hugs him instead, her face buried into his shoulder, and he can feel her wet eyes pressed to his sweater. He blinks through the cloud of her hair in his face and holds her as tightly as he can manage without crushing the letter.
</p>
<p>
He tries to remember the last years of his parents’ lives, when his father’s disappointment in him seemed written all over his face -- how much did he misread? The guilt and anger over letting this happen to him and Alexis that he’s been directing inward all this time, maybe none of it came from his dad, who loved him despite the immortality, the proof of it in his careful copperplate right here in David’s hands. 
</p>
<p>
He wishes painfully that he could go back, just for ten minutes with his father. Just to rewrite some of it.
</p>
<p>
They put everything back in the box as carefully as they can. Whenever David feels himself starting to tear up again, Patrick is there, a hand on his shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“Well, that was a blast from the past,” Alexis jokes weakly. 
</p>
<p>
“Your dad was such a cute guy,” Stevie says, wiping at her eyes.
</p>
<p>
“The sweetest.”
</p>
<p>
David stares at the box that his dad has given them, a gift sent to them from a hundred years ago. It’s a lot. Too much, maybe. He sniffs and looks around the store.
</p>
<p>
“There’s dust everywhere and there’s a <em>hole</em> in my wall,” David complains to Patrick, like he doesn’t know, and Patrick raises an acquiescent hand. 
</p>
<p>
“I will have someone here to fix it bright and early tomorrow morning.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, but what if a mouse comes and goes into the wall and then I have mice?”
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, reaching up to hold his face. “I will personally come here at the crack of dawn tomorrow morning to check that there aren’t mice in your walls first. Okay?” David nods in Patrick’s hands.
</p>
<p>
“Wow,” Stevie says under her breath.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, out!” David snaps. “Don’t you two have somewhere to be?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes,” Alexis says. “We will see you at the bonfire. Don’t be late!” She bops David’s nose on her way by to get her coat from the side room.
</p>
<p>
“Mkay.”
</p>
<p>
Alone again, David looks around his temporarily destroyed store and rubs his arms. 
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says softly, sliding his hands around David’s hips. 
</p>
<p>
“Mm.”
</p>
<p>
“You okay?”
</p>
<p>
“Mm. It’s just. A lot to process.”
</p>
<p>
“Sure.”
</p>
<p>
“So.”
</p>
<p>
“So,” Patrick repeats, teasing.
</p>
<p>
“We’ve known each other a year.”
</p>
<p>
“We have.”
</p>
<p>
“Is there anything you want to say to me?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, are you expecting something?”
</p>
<p>
“You have given me the cheesiest gifts every single month since March including an actual singing telegram and I swear to god, Patrick, if you organized a-a parade, or something, at the bonfire tonight --”
</p>
<p>
“No parade,” Patrick says solemnly. He smacks a kiss to David’s cheek. “Time to get ready though, huh?”
</p>
<p>
Leaving him with a suspicious look, David goes into the back to change to his bonfire outfit, taking the wooden box with him to keep in the back safe while they’re out at the bonfire. He can hear Patrick sweeping up the store and singing to himself as David gets dressed and he smiles, shaking his head.
</p>
<p>
Unbelievable.
</p>
<p>
He checks his reflection in the mirror and with an approving nod goes to pull on his coat. He hasn’t worn it since last year, and after he slips it on he checks the pockets to see if he’d forgotten to clean them out before putting it away in 4C. 
</p>
<p>
He’s always meticulous about storing his clothes, though, which is why it’s a surprise when his fingers close on a small box in the right pocket. Brow furrowed, he pulls it out and looks for a shop name or label, but finds nothing. He truly doesn’t recognize it.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says, and David hadn’t heard him come into the back room. It’s tight with the breakfront and boxes of cleared product back here, and Patrick stands so close David can see the flecks of gold in his eyes. 
</p>
<p>
“Patrick,” he says wonderingly. 
</p>
<p>
“Um. When we first met,” Patrick begins, and David’s brain whites out. “I was so alone and lost and then I walked into your store here and it felt like, oh, there you are. You’re what I’ve been looking for. And I know you come with baggage.” David nods dumbly. “So do I. But I love you and you make my life better in a thousand different ways every single day. So. I know marriage is a weird thing for you with the legal side of things, but would you --”
</p>
<p>
“Yes.”
</p>
<p>
“David.”
</p>
<p>
“Sorry, go ahead.”
</p>
<p>
“Twyla was telling me about something they used to do at the bonfires, the hand-fasting. A kind of commitment for the years to come, she said.”
</p>
<p>
“I remember,” David whispers. Patrick’s mouth twitches in a smile.
</p>
<p>
“Would you want to?”
</p>
<p>
“Even if there are paper rings in this jewelry box that you <em>hid in my coat</em>, oh my god.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick laughs. “They are not made of paper.” 
</p>
<p>
He opens the box and shows David a row of gold rings, a match to the silver ones David wears every day, and David has to drop his head back, overwhelmed.
</p>
<p>
“I want to commit to you, David Rose,” Patrick says softly, close enough to kiss, but instead David hitches in a breath and tries not to cry. "However much time I have. I want to spend it with you."
</p>
<p>
He nods and nods and, hands shaking, pulls off his silver rings one by one and drops them into the jewelry box, which he then puts in the wooden box. Patrick takes his hand and slides on the gold rings in the same configuration he’s been wearing the silver ones today.
</p>
<p>
Closing his eyes to the tears building, David kisses him and Patrick kisses back with no hesitation, pulling David closer with a hand on his lower back, more intimate than sex; a promise.
</p>
<p>
“I have an idea,” David says, unable to pull back the smile. “Come out to the clearing.”
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“Stevie always goes before the bonfire and it’s been years since I went with her. We should go.”
</p>
<p>
“Every year?” Patrick asks, his eyes lighting up. “Like a ritual?” 
</p>
<p>
David can <em>feel</em> his fingers itching to pull out his notebook.
</p>
<p>
“You are such a dork,” David murmurs against his mouth. 
</p>
<p>
“Just what you want to hear from your partner,” Patrick says, his eyes sparkling.
</p>
<p>
The leaves are a little wet underfoot from the rain the night before, but the trees are just turning red and gold and birds twitter overhead as they walk through the darkening woods. In the distance, a chipmunk skitters through the brush and up a tree.
</p>
<p>
David keeps getting distracted by the glint of his gold rings in the scattered beams of sunlight that backlight the leaves around them as Patrick peppers him with questions about how the clearing works.
</p>
<p>
“So does she have a specific incantation or something?” Patrick asks as they approach. Alexis greets them with cheek kisses at its edge, less surprised by their appearance than he’d expected.
</p>
<p>
“For the thousandth time, I’m not a witch,” Stevie says from the middle of the circle, the setting sun lighting her golden from head to toe.
</p>
<p>
“Have you ever met one, though?” Alexis calls.
</p>
<p>
She flips them off.
</p>
<p>
“So what’s she doing?” Patrick asks, craning his neck. 
</p>
<p>
“It’s a… what’s the word?” David asks Alexis.
</p>
<p>
“Reciprocal.”
</p>
<p>
“Reciprocal thing. It recharges her, she recharges it.”
</p>
<p>
As they watch, the sun drifts down and lights the leaves around the clearing so that they seem to glow from within.
</p>
<p>
“This is so weird,” Stevie says self-consciously. “Stop staring at me!”
</p>
<p>
“You’re beautiful!” David shouts, smarmy as hell, just to annoy her. 
</p>
<p>
“I just got a gnat in my eye.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, ew,” Alexis says. 
</p>
<p>
Stevie tilts her head back and seems to breathe in the sun, the old ring of trees around her bright green and gold. Most of the time, he forgets what she is, but here she looks like a goddess, radiating the light of the setting sun.
</p>
<p>
“So Patrick,” Alexis says, “after she does this, for the next year she’ll be connected to the weather patterns around here. Kind of cool, right?”
</p>
<p>
“And idiots like you will be repelled from my grove so that no one else will accidentally stumble into it,” Stevie adds. Alexis grimaces.
</p>
<p>
“Sorry,” she calls. “She is beautiful, though, isn’t she?” She leans into David’s side and pulls his arm over her shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“Mm. She is.”
</p>
<p>
They watch her breathe, entranced, until she stands up straight again, settling back into her human bones.
</p>
<p>
“Time for some marshmallows and booze,” Stevie announces. Alexis claps her hands.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, wait,” David says, taking Patrick’s elbow. “Um. While we’re here. Do you…”
</p>
<p>
Stevie opens her mouth to say something, but doesn’t, and Patrick’s eyes dart between them. 
</p>
<p>
“Do I want to --” Patrick clarifies, pointing at the clearing. 
</p>
<p>
The sun is setting more quickly, now, and they’ve got to hurry if they want to get to the bonfire before all the marshmallows are gone, but. David shrugs, belying his pounding heart.
</p>
<p>
“I… Can I think about it?”
</p>
<p>
“Sure, of course,” David says quickly. 
</p>
<p>
“Take a couple of years,” Alexis suggests. “David’s looking forward to seeing you as an old man.” She winks obnoxiously.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, Alexis, why don’t you find the nearest telephone pole and --”
</p>
<p>
“Got it,” Patrick interrupts, smiling indulgently. “Let’s go.”
</p>
<p>
They pick their way back out of the woods, following the shallow beams from their phone flashlights. Ahead of him and Patrick, Alexis chatters away to Stevie, no skirts brushing the loam this time but her boots carelessly skim piles of leaves as she happily heads back to the inn with Stevie on her arm. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick walks calmly at David’s side, his hands stuffed into his pockets, his cute little hat framing his face, his rings on David’s fingers. 
</p>
<p>
“I understand if you don’t want to spend an eternity with them,” David says, when he can’t bear it any longer. Patrick huffs a laugh.
</p>
<p>
“That’s not it.”
</p>
<p>
“So it’s me, then.”
</p>
<p>
"David. I meant it when I said that I'm committing to you," Patrick says, looking him in the eyes like he needs to make sure David hears this, and warmth rushes through David's chest.
</p>
<p>
"I know," David says, looking down at his rings, and is almost surprised to realize that he does believe it. 
</p>
<p>
“It’s a big thing,” Patrick says slowly, like he’s thinking about it as he speaks. “And I respect you too much to jump into it without giving it enough thought. It would be so easy for me to say yes, because I do want forever with you, David.” 
</p>
<p>
"It's a very long time."
</p>
<p>
“I know it is. Of course I’ve thought about it hypothetically: if it were possible, would I want to?” 
</p>
<p>
“You mean everything I’ve been complaining about hasn’t sold you on immortality?”
</p>
<p>
“I know, weird, right?”
</p>
<p>
David cracks a smile and Patrick smiles fondly back. David wants to keep that smile; he wants to spend the rest of forever making it happen.
</p>
<p>
“And, um, what did you think, hypothetically?”
</p>
<p>
“I think one day I will. I’d like to watch the world change with you.”
</p>
<p>
“It happens both fast and slow. Like this,” David says, nodding at the saplings pushing up towards their taller siblings. “The woods have been here for as long as I have, but they’re thicker and taller, and I couldn’t tell you when it happened. Stevie said that when she first moved here, you could even see the roof of the inn from the clearing.”
</p>
<p>
“Wait, so you lived through the entire twentieth century,” Patrick says suddenly.
</p>
<p>
“Mhm.”
</p>
<p>
“Did you ever meet anyone I’d have heard of?”
</p>
<p>
A smile pulls at David’s mouth and he squeezes Patrick’s arm. “Let me tell you about the time I met Frank Sinatra smoking behind a cabaret in Montreal….”
</p>
<p>
The bonfire is already well underway by the time they get to the field by the barn. Under Vidya’s leadership, there are legitimate apple-themed games for the kids and much better organized tables of s’mores supplies and cider, including booze-free caramel cider. David’s pretty sure that the bonfire was likely lit in one try with cheerful ceremony. 
</p>
<p>
Emir’s band is playing again, but Stevie doesn’t even seem to notice, laughing at something Alexis is saying. She glows in the firelight and her hair ripples behind her in a dark curtain, her eyes ember-bright, but what gets David is Alexis’s toothy smile, her eyes crinkled; it’s not her most flattering look, but he’s never seen her so happy, and she’s radiant. Stevie kisses her and she smiles into it, like she can’t stop even to kiss Stevie properly. Patrick notices him watching and rubs a hand up his back, meeting his eyes with a smile.
</p>
<p>
David grabs a bag of marshmallows, some crackers, and some chocolate, all of it in an awkward pile in his arms, and Patrick takes four pre-filled cups of cider from the table, singing the drummer’s <em>bum-bum-bum</em>s under his breath.
</p>
<p>
The crowd is raucous in the best way, loud and happy and bright around the fire, and David even finds himself smiling at people he recognizes as they pass by. He suspects Patrick’s cheerful friendliness may have rubbed off on him.
</p>
<p>
By the fire, Patrick hands off Stevie and Alexis’s ciders and David passes around the goods. Once each of the four of them has a drink and a marshmallow on a stick, Stevie clears her throat.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t usually do speeches, because they’re dumb,” she says. Alexis nods knowingly and David rolls his eyes. “But I am happy that you’re here celebrating with me. All of you. I love you. That’s it.” 
</p>
<p>
Alexis kisses the crown of her head and David says “I love you” back so quietly that she may not have heard, but she smiles at him, her eyes glinting, and he knows she has.
</p>
<p>
“Um. While we’re doing speeches,” Patrick says, “I just wanted to say how lucky I feel every single day here. I’ve never really found anywhere that feels like a home so much as here, and all three of you have made that happen for me, so. Thank you. And, David, I don’t even know what to say, except that you make me happier than I ever thought I could be. You are actually the love of my life. And I can’t wait to change with you.” 
</p>
<p>
David rubs Patrick’s shoulder, mouth twisting, and Alexis gasps and hits his arm.
</p>
<p>
“Um, Patrick! You put a ring on it!”
</p>
<p>
David flushes and holds out his hand for her to admire his new gold rings.
</p>
<p>
“God, you really do love him,” Stevie says, wrinkling her nose. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick smiles and rubs David’s back, like he knows he’s inches from being overwhelmed.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, are you guys hand-fasting?” Twyla asks from behind Alexis. “I was wondering if you would!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, not yet,” Patrick assures her.
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, no,” David adds quickly, wincing. “I need a ceremony much more lavish than this.” Patrick laughs, which is nice if a bit concerningly casual.
</p>
<p>
“Oh. Well, you’re kind of halfway there already,” Twyla says. “David, do you want to go next?”
</p>
<p>
“I -- alright.” He should feel pretty stupid, standing here holding a marshmallow on a stick, but Patrick’s waiting for his answer and he realizes he does have something to say. “It, um. It felt like it would be a lot easier to let you go when you didn’t even know who I really am. And it was worse when it felt like I had to let you go because of who I am. But you make me so happy and feel so loved and you are literally my favorite person in the world, which is saying something because I’ve met a lot of people over the years. I’m not interested in choosing a life without you. And you <em>will</em> look beautiful as you get older; I’m sorry, it’s true,” he adds, shaking his head, as Patrick laughs wetly. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick kisses him fiercely and David can taste cider on his tongue and has the fleeting thought that maybe tomorrow he can lick cinnamon sugar from his lips on the roof of the town hall again, and won’t that be nice?
</p>
<p>
“Aw, you guys!” Twyla says, her hands under her chin. “Do you think maybe you’ve broken the spell? It sure looks like true love to me!” 
</p>
<p>
“I don’t think that’s how it works,” David says, squinting over at her.
</p>
<p>
“No, I’m pretty sure.”
</p>
<p>
David looks at Patrick, who shrugs. 
</p>
<p>
“Mmkay,” David says. “Well, I’ve been waiting for this competition all year, so if we could just get to it, please.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay!” Stevie holds up her marshmallow. “Let’s do this.”
</p>
<p>
“Twyla, are you playing?” Alexis asks. Twyla’s eyes light up and Alexis helps her get her skewer ready.
</p>
<p>
“On the count of three!” Stevie calls. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick darts a quick kiss to David’s cheek and David, grinning, tells him, “No cheating.”
</p>
<p>
“Three! Two! One! Roast!”
</p>
<p>
They’re both mildly tipsy by the time they get back to the inn, and it takes David a few tries to unlock his door with his key, Patrick not helping by trying to suck a new hickey onto his neck. He’s doing a poor job of it, because he keeps laughing, but still. Unhelpful.
</p>
<p>
David tells him this and Patrick squeezes his ass in response.
</p>
<p>
Finally he gets the door open and they stumble through.
</p>
<p>
“I’m hungry,” Patrick says, like it’s just occurred to him.
</p>
<p>
“There are carrots and hummus for you in the fridge,” David says, carefully unwrapping his scarf. 
</p>
<p>
He switches on one of his bedside lights and leaves the rest off; it casts a nice glow around the room and then he won’t have to get up or ask Patrick to get up to turn off the light when they inevitably end up in bed.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, what’s this?” Patrick asks, pulling a white paper bag out of the mini-refrigerator that David’s started keeping in the room for him. David glances over.
</p>
<p>
“Irish peach apples. I picked them up on Wednesday on my way back from meeting a vendor up north. We should try them soon; they don’t last.”
</p>
<p>
“Sounds like the perfect midnight snack,” Patrick murmurs, his hands sliding onto David’s hips from behind him. David smiles to himself.
</p>
<p>
“And what do you think we’ll be doing to work up such an appetite?”
</p>
<p>
“Little of this,” Patrick says, and kisses one side of David’s neck. “Little of that.” David’s jaw. His breath smells of cider and chocolate.
</p>
<p>
“Hmm.”
</p>
<p>
“I brought a tweed blazer with me,” Patrick murmurs right in David’s ear and David laughs out loud, his head falling back.
</p>
<p>
“What a line,” he says happily, turning in Patrick’s arms. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick beams at him and David has to kiss him. He kisses back surely, confidently, his thumb on David’s cheekbone to keep him at just the angle he wants, the pressure that makes David melt. He has no doubt, too, that Patrick <em>has</em> brought a tweed blazer with him.
</p>
<p>
“I love you,” he whispers against Patrick’s mouth; it’s ferocious as fire, sparking and unfurling out of his chest; he can’t hold it in, sometimes, and he wants to live in it for as long as he can.
</p>
<p>
“I love you too,” Patrick says back, no hesitation, punctuated with another kiss.
</p>
<p>
He’d thought it would be hard, letting someone into his space after having it alone for so long, but Patrick is still in Montreal from Monday mornings through Wednesday nights to teach, and some nights it feels like the missing him will consume him. 
</p>
<p>
On those nights he gets together with Alexis and Stevie if they’re in town, or calls Patrick and listens to him tell David all about his day with his students, his classes, his thesis. 
</p>
<p>
He feels so lucky to have someone to miss like this, who always always comes back for him.
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says softly, one hand on David’s cheek.
</p>
<p>
“Hm?”
</p>
<p>
“Happy anniversary.”
</p>
<p>
“Happy anniversary,” David whispers, his hands going to Patrick’s wonderful shoulders automatically, staring into his eyes, feeling the full weight of the love radiating back at him. 
</p>
<p>
“Did you think when we met a year ago that we’d be here?” Patrick asks, wrapping his arms around David’s waist.
</p>
<p>
“Mm, let’s see. You were in the shower and I knocked on the door --”
</p>
<p>
“Banged, actually.”
</p>
<p>
“And went to find Stevie and when I came back you were coming out of the bathroom, all naked and muscled and wet. No, it never crossed my mind to have sex with you.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re such an asshole,” Patrick says, laughing, and it sounds like <em>I love you.</em> “On that topic.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm.”
</p>
<p>
“The blazer thing. Is it like a teacher fantasy or is it the actual piece of clothing? Because normally I would assume the first one but with you --”
</p>
<p>
David kisses him, grinning through it, and Patrick pulls up the hem of his sweater and slides one hand up his bare back and the other down the back of his pants; immediately blood starts heading south and David pulls him closer by the shoulders, rubbing against the bulge growing in Patrick’s pants.
</p>
<p>
“Mkay, wait,” he gasps, pulling away from Patrick’s mouth. 
</p>
<p>
“What?” He’s beautiful, his pupils blown wide and mouth reddened already.
</p>
<p>
“The blazer?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god.” He presses another kiss to David’s mouth and goes to David’s closet, where there is indeed a blazer hanging on Patrick’s side. “I can’t believe you didn’t see it earlier.” Patrick shrugs it on over his henley and shakes out his arms.
</p>
<p>
“I didn’t realize it was for me.”
</p>
<p>
“It’s all for you.” Patrick winces. “Sorry. Was that too cheesy?”
</p>
<p>
“Unbearably,” David says, an unstoppable smile breaking across his face. Patrick’s hands return to his waist, reclaiming him.
</p>
<p>
“So what’s the fantasy?”
</p>
<p>
“Nothing, specifically. I just really like this look.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, okay,” Patrick says, and leans up to kiss him, licking into his mouth. He can’t tell which one of them is breathing heavily; he thinks it might be him, but Patrick has a hand twisted in the back of his hair and gasps when David slides a hand up his henley, thumb tweaking at his nipple. He fumbles for the lapels of Patrick’s blazer and tugs it off, dropping it on the back of his desk chair; he’s drawn back into Patrick’s hands like a magnet and Patrick kisses him again, again, his hands twisted in David’s hair. “God, David,” Patrick pants.
</p>
<p>
David wraps a hand around the crook of Patrick’s jaw and the gold rings glint in the lamplight. “Love you,” he breathes against Patrick’s cheek and Patrick kisses him again, his mouth swollen.
</p>
<p>
“So much,” Patrick agrees, and sucks on David’s neck, and David’s cock strains against his zipper.
</p>
<p>
“Oh god, bed. Bed bed bed.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick shucks his pants and pulls off his shirt and David removes his clothes barely more carefully before climbing onto the bed over him, his knees planted outside Patrick’s beautiful strong thighs.
</p>
<p>
“Hey,” Patrick says softly, one hand coming up to caress David’s face. David slows his hips and waits as Patrick looks into his eyes and brushes a thumb across his cheek. “I don’t love you <em>despite</em> your immortality. You know that, right?” David presses his lips together and Patrick smiles and reaches down to stroke David’s cock. “I love who you are, and that includes trying to help Alexis whether it’s at a nunnery or in the woods, and loving your family so much you keep a picture of them in your store, and going after Stevie in the rain --” he twists his hand and David gasps, arching -- “and being cynical and hopeful and caring and bringing me sandwiches when I’m working too hard to remember to eat --” he speeds up his strokes, drags his lower lip up David’s neck -- “and dancing with me in public just because I asked you to and --”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, my god, just fuck me!”
</p>
<p>
Patrick bruises an open-mouthed kiss on David’s lips and whispers there, “I love that, too.” He reaches across to grab the lube and a condom foil from the nightstand drawer and David runs a hand up his chest, already tacky with exertion, to his shoulder. Patrick pours lube onto his fingers and works one and then two into David; David grips his shoulder tightly and his hips rock on Patrick’s fingers. Sweat drips down his temple and he wipes it away and starts stroking Patrick with as much coordination as he can manage.
</p>
<p>
“Nng, David, wait --”
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
“I’m gonna -- wait, wait --” Patrick scrunches his face and David reaches for the condom, his sweaty fingers fumbling with the foil trying to get it open.
</p>
<p>
“Okay okay okay,” he mutters when he finally tears it. He rolls it onto Patrick’s dick and presses a messy kiss to his mouth, moaning when Patrick crooks his fingers inside him. “Oh my god.”
</p>
<p>
“David, now?”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah, hold on --” He moves up on his hands and knees and sinks back on Patrick’s cock held firm in his hand and Patrick moans loudly, his head tilting back, the flush spreading from his chest up to his ears. He rolls his hips experimentally and Patrick’s chest heaves.
</p>
<p>
“God, you feel so good, David,” he pants, and starts thrusting up into David, filling him up over and over. “So good, David, love you, love you --”
</p>
<p>
David leans down and mouths a kiss on his neck and Patrick turns his head to catch his lips and David gives him the kiss he’s asking for, he can’t not; Patrick’s hair is curling with sweat and his hands pull David close and David knows with an ecstasy that lights up his bones that he would risk anything for this. Any future heartbreak would be worth this, but Patrick laces his fingers through David’s beringed ones and says, “I love you love you love you,” and David believes him.
</p>
<p>
Afterward, when he’s resting his head on Patrick’s shoulder and coming down from the rush, Patrick lovingly brushes his fingers through David’s hair and David thinks life really couldn’t get any better.
</p>
<p>
“David,” Patrick says seriously, his eyes big and honeyed in the low light. “I don’t want to ruin this moment for you.”
</p>
<p>
“Hm?”
</p>
<p>
“But I think you have a grey hair.” 
</p>
<p>
“What?”
</p>
<p>
He fingers the short hair at David’s temple. “Just here.”
</p>
<p>
“Motherf-”
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. All Aglow</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <h3>2021</h3>
<p>
“Once upon a time,” David says to Meggie, who looks up at him with her big dumb doggie smile and wags her fringed tail, “I followed your Aunt Alexis into the woods and basically became magic for almost the entire twentieth century.”
</p>
<p>
He looks over his shoulder through the sliding glass door to check that Patrick’s not going to come out of the house and catch him telling this story to the dog.
</p>
<p>
Satisfied that his husband is still busy making the pizza for dinner, he turns back to their collie and pushes his foot against the wood planks of the deck to rock the swing.
</p>
<p>
“Anyway, even though my only power was basically to not die, it was still magic. It counts,” he tells her sternly. She licks his hand. “No, thank you.”
</p>
<p>
A gust of wind blows a few red-orange leaves from the big oak that Patrick keeps threatening to have taken down -- one bad storm and it’ll fall on the house, he says, but it just looks so pretty -- and Meggie eyes one as it sails past.
</p>
<p>
“Your Aunt Stevie can do a little more, but you’ve seen her. She spoils you, conjuring up snowstorms just to see you do your silly snow dance.” Meggie stares off into the twilit distance, probably keeping an eye on a chipmunk or something. “Anyway. Where were we? So after a hundred years of waiting, stuck in that inn with Aunt Stevie and Aunt Alexis, your dad finally came to town when he was working on his degree and he interviewed me about our store. I first ran into him in the hallway of the inn when he was coming out of the shower and, let me tell you, that was a meeting you do not forget. And he was so nice and funny and smart and, well, something just sparked.” He pauses. “That’s real magic, you know? Something the gods don’t really know anything about.”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, I don’t know,” Patrick says behind him, and David winces and looks around. Patrick smiles down at him fondly, leaning against the side of the doorway with his arms folded, a glass of water in one hand. “I think they knew what they were doing. After all, without them we wouldn’t be here.” 
</p>
<p>
He drops down onto the rocking bench next to David, handing him a cool glass of water before slinging an arm on the backrest behind him. Meggie wags her tail so hard it thumps against the boards and Patrick pets her head.
</p>
<p>
“You are such a softie.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re the one telling our dog the story of how we met,” Patrick says mildly.
</p>
<p>
“Hm. Well. That’s neither here nor there.”
</p>
<p>
“Right.”
</p>
<p>
“I checked the website, by the way. Alexis and Stevie’s plane is still scheduled to arrive on time around ten.”
</p>
<p>
“Sounds good. It’ll be nice to have them back.” He nudges his knee against David’s. “The pizza will be ready in fifteen minutes.”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, thank you. You know, we could have ordered in, and then you wouldn’t have had to go through all that trouble.”
</p>
<p>
“When I bought the dough, I thought you would be helping me.”
</p>
<p>
“I was keeping your dog company!”
</p>
<p>
“Our dog.”
</p>
<p>
“She’s all yours when she’s shedding all over my new Rick Owens,” David says under his breath. 
</p>
<p>
“That’s what we bought the twelve-pack of lint rollers for.”
</p>
<p>
Despite himself, David strokes a hand through her thick fur. Never really a pet person, he’d been hesitant at first, but Patrick had fallen in love with her at first sight and David couldn’t say that she wasn’t beautiful. And she really is the sweetest creature he’s ever known, even if she does shed bolts of fur twice a year. He won’t admit it out loud, but it’s actually quite nice, brushing her out. It soothes the part of him that likes keeping things neat.
</p>
<p>
Patrick absently traces his fingers up and down David’s shoulder and he’s got his work face on as he stares up at the stars that flicker through passing clouds.
</p>
<p>
“What’s the schedule for next week?” David asks, a gentle prompting. Patrick opened a consulting business after getting his degree, and it’s grown steadily over the last few years. While he tries to balance it with his time helping David with the Apothecary, sometimes he gets overwhelmed and David has flashbacks to him breaking down in 4C and again the week before his thesis was due. 
</p>
<p>
“Ah, Jeanne-Marie wants to meet on Monday in Thornbridge to go over their community engagement budget.”
</p>
<p>
“I assume you’re not expecting me to go.”
</p>
<p>
“Do you want to? I think she just has questions about Thornbridge’s projected revenue stream from our preliminary schedule of events. I told her that it may take a little while to see a significant ROI since they’re basically starting from scratch, but…”
</p>
<p>
“She wants to see your numbers.”
</p>
<p>
“Yeah.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, as long as you’re up there…”
</p>
<p>
“I will get you one of the mennonites’ apple crumble pies on my way back.”
</p>
<p>
“You do love me.”
</p>
<p>
“Just a little,” Patrick murmurs, kissing him gently. “And then we’ve got your wine tasting at the Apothecary on Wednesday.”
</p>
<p>
“And we are officially out of the Ertlinger wine, so no more --”
</p>
<p>
“Actually,” Patrick cuts in, and David groans. 
</p>
<p>
“No!”
</p>
<p>
“Herb dropped off another crate.”
</p>
<p>
“Goddamnit!”
</p>
<p>
“He said it’s an apple and banana fruit wine this time.”
</p>
<p>
“No,” David says firmly, holding up his hands. “No. I refuse to serve any more of that… that swill.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you going to be the one to tell him that?”
</p>
<p>
David drops his head back in frustration and Patrick smiles at Meggie, who wags her tail.
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” he says finally. “I have a deal.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m listening,” Patrick says, stealing a sip of David’s water.
</p>
<p>
“The loser of the marshmallow roast at the bonfire tomorrow has to do it.”
</p>
<p>
“So we’re just ignoring the fact that you win every year because you’ve had a hundred and five years of practice roasting marshmallows.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, rude.”
</p>
<p>
“I guess I knew what I was marrying into,” Patrick says, pressing a kiss to David’s temple, where he has reluctantly allowed the few strands of silver hair to stay, partly because Patrick seems to love it. And Patrick himself has a few specks of grey, and when he pairs it with a hot teacher look… well. Neither of them has any complaints in that department.
</p>
<p>
“Speaking of which, your anniversary gift finally arrived. I set it up in the office.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s face lights up. It’s a little embarrassing that David hadn’t been able to give it to him on their actual wedding anniversary on the third, but he blames Stevie for going off to Barcelona with Alexis and leaving him to deal with her new assistant, who did not know or care where she stored the antique furniture that was replaced with the cheaper, more durable stuff years ago. It took him weeks to track it down with only infrequent emails with Stevie to help.
</p>
<p>
Inside the house the oven timer dings, and Meggie lifts her head with perked ears.
</p>
<p>
“Dinner time?” David asks her, lilting his voice in dog-speak he would vehemently deny using. She tilts her head. “I agree. What pizza monstrosity are you forcing upon us today, husband?”
</p>
<p>
“Mushrooms, black olives, green peppers.”
</p>
<p>
“Why anyone would want vegetables on a pizza is beyond me.”
</p>
<p>
“We all have our flaws,” Patrick says good-naturedly, following Meggie and David inside. “David, don’t --” he starts to say, but David drops a piece of cheesy olive on the floor and Meggie inhales it. “-- give it to the dog,” he finishes with a sigh.
</p>
<p>
“She’s the one with the garbage disposal for a stomach.”
</p>
<p>
“Ted’s going to kill me. I <em>promised</em> him we’d stop feeding her table scraps.”
</p>
<p>
“Do plants count as table scraps?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes, and it’s covered in greasy cheese!”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, fine.”
</p>
<p>
David considers taking his time eating, but Patrick keeps glancing over his shoulder at the door to the office and he doesn’t have the heart to make him keep waiting.
</p>
<p>
When their dishes are cleared and the pizza pan left in the sink where Meggie can’t reach, David guides Patrick to their little home office with his hands over his eyes.
</p>
<p>
“Is this really necessary, David?”
</p>
<p>
“Yes. Shh. Watch out for Meggie.”
</p>
<p>
“How do I --”
</p>
<p>
“Come on, Megs, out of the way.” David shoos her out of Patrick’s path with a gentle foot, which only barely hinders her. “Ms. Ryan, you are a menace. Okay. I have a preface.”
</p>
<p>
“Okay,” Patrick says with a sigh. 
</p>
<p>
“I love you.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s face relaxes into his David-smile, the fond one David sees whenever he does something especially thoughtful. Five years since Patrick put these rings on his fingers he still treasures that look, the one that says he’s done something right, that who he is is exactly right.
</p>
<p>
“I love you, too. Can I look now?”
</p>
<p>
“Okay.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick drops his hands and his eyes quickly rove the small room filled with their original desk and many overfilled bookshelves, looking for what’s new, and it doesn’t take long for him to notice the antique secretary desk now shoved into the spot the underneath the pictures of their family smiling down at them from their place on the wall: the Brewers, on their anniversary cruise; the Roses and Stevie, a hundred years ago; David and Patrick and Stevie and Alexis, at the bonfire last year.
</p>
<p>
“What -- David --”
</p>
<p>
“It’s the desk from the room that L. M. Montgomery stayed in at the boarding house. It was before my time so I can’t vouch for its authenticity, but Stevie swore that it’s the one. And that it was really her. I even told her it was a gift for you, so I know she wasn’t just messing with me.”
</p>
<p>
“David…,” Patrick says, awed. He brushes a flat hand across the writing surface. Meggie follows him and sniffs it for good measure, although it already passed her sniff test when it was delivered. 
</p>
<p>
Patrick’s wide eyes take in the desk, looking into all the drawers, and he trades glances with Meggie when he crouches down to look into the drawers that go down to the floor. Her interrogatory tail, held high, brushes across Patrick’s face, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
</p>
<p>
“What do you think?” he asks her; she noses at his ear in response and he laughs.
</p>
<p>
“Survey says?”
</p>
<p>
Patrick ruffles Meggie’s ears and smiles up at him, eyes shining, which is an answer in itself.
</p>
<p>
“I love it. Thank you.”
</p>
<p>
He knew he would, but there’s still the rush of relief, the pleased wiggle he can’t fully suppress. Patrick slides an arm around his waist and kisses his neck, watching Meggie sniff happily around the room as he holds David. 
</p>
<p>
David feels his phone alarm buzz in his back pocket and for a second selfishly considers leaving Alexis and Stevie at the airport, just to stand here with Patrick a little while longer. But Patrick must hear it vibrate and gives David a look that says he knows what David’s thinking and regrets that he can’t go along with it. 
</p>
<p>
David frowns and makes a displeased noise and Patrick presses another kiss to his cheek.
</p>
<p>
“Later,” Patrick promises. “Let’s go get them from the airport.”
</p>
<p>
“But -- oh, fine. I still can’t believe you know someone who can forge passports.”
</p>
<p>
“Good to know I can still surprise you.”
</p>
<p>
David grins and kisses him properly, sliding a hand into his back pocket to keep him close.
</p>
<p>
“Barcelona,” he says thoughtfully. “What a town. Is there anywhere you want to go?”
</p>
<p>
“Somewhere sunny,” Patrick says, and presses his mouth to the side of David’s neck. “Somewhere you’ve never been before.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick insists on getting to the baggage terminal fifteen minutes before Alexis and Stevie’s plane is scheduled to land, and then they have to wait in the cell phone lot because the traffic cops won’t let anyone idle in the terminal lanes, and they’re the last ones out of the terminal anyway because Alexis likes to stop at the restroom on the way out of the airport. This happens every single time they pick them up, and yet here they are.
</p>
<p>
When David finally spots his sister and Patrick pulls up to the curb, he has to force a smile. He would really rather be in bed with his husband right now instead of watching Patrick get more and more stressed out by other drivers paying no attention to their surroundings and pedestrians who come out of nowhere. But then he sees Stevie and Alexis’s faces and something in him that he hadn’t realized was tense relaxes.
</p>
<p>
“Hey, travelers! How was Barcelona?” Patrick asks, leaning over David to talk to Alexis through the passenger window. 
</p>
<p>
“Stunning,” Alexis says.
</p>
<p>
“Crowded,” Stevie corrects. “Also, I’m physically incapable of getting hungover and I think I’m hungover.” They drop their bags into the trunk and Stevie slams it shut.
</p>
<p>
“Well, we’re happy to see you. Aren’t we, David?”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, yes. You couldn’t have scheduled a flight that got in a little earlier, though? Like, during the day, maybe?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh, please, David,” Alexis says. She climbs into the backseat behind him and her knees bump into his back. He gives Patrick a pleading look and Patrick rubs his thigh in sympathy. 
</p>
<p>
“So where are we dropping you?” Patrick asks as he pulls back into traffic. “The inn? Or do you want to come stay at the house for the night?”
</p>
<p>
“Actually, Stevie was hoping to spend some time with our niece!”
</p>
<p>
“Okay, you do know that she’s a dog and not a child, though, right?” David says, twisting over his shoulder to give Alexis a raised eyebrow. She makes a face back at him.
</p>
<p>
“Also, I think we left some expired food in our fridge and I don’t really feel up to dealing with that tonight,” Stevie says. David grimaces in disgust.
</p>
<p>
“Well, we’re always happy to have you. Right, David?”
</p>
<p>
“Mm, sure.”
</p>
<p>
“There’s the enthusiasm you like to hear,” Stevie says. 
</p>
<p>
“I’m sorry. Nothing would make me happier than to have you people imposing on our peace and quiet.” He meets her eyes in the rearview mirror as he says it and his jaw crooks and she smiles back at him, seeing through the sarcasm. He wonders if the people of Barcelona recognized what she is, or if their eyes skimmed over her, missing the magic walking among them.
</p>
<p>
It’s a night of catching up over the kitchen table and going to bed early for all of them, but when David gets up in the middle of the night for some water, he sees the light on over the back deck. He grabs the afghan Patrick’s mother crocheted for them from the back of the couch and quietly pulls open the sliding door.
</p>
<p>
“I don’t need a blanket, David. I’m not going to catch a cold,” Alexis says, not looking at him, hugging her elbows. 
</p>
<p>
“How did -- whatever.” David sits next to her on the bench and drapes the aghan over both their laps anyway. “Are you sure?” he asks finally.
</p>
<p>
They’d wondered when it broke for David whether it would do the same for Alexis, but while the crinkles by his eyes have slowly deepened, she still looks the same.
</p>
<p>
“Yeah.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you okay?”
</p>
<p>
She wriggles closer and rests her head on his shoulder.
</p>
<p>
“I’ll miss you,” she says finally. 
</p>
<p>
“I’m not going anywhere yet.”
</p>
<p>
“Are you scared?”
</p>
<p>
“Of being mortal?”
</p>
<p>
She nods. He works a finger through the holes in the weave of the afghan as he thinks.
</p>
<p>
“Not really. I’m not going up any ladders because I am <em>entirely</em> uninterested in wearing a cast for weeks on end, and I got vaccinated and everything. But I get to spend the rest of my life with Patrick and then… I don’t know. It feels more like peace than anything else.”
</p>
<p>
“I’m glad,” she says, taking his hand and squeezing it. There’s a rustling in the trees and they watch a deer step carefully toward the apple tree and bend gracefully to take a bite of one of the crabapples on the ground. Down the street a dog barks and the deer looks up, ears pricked, and skitters back into the safety of the trees.
</p>
<p>
“Do you hate me for going into the woods that day?” she asks, staring out into the darkness. It’s the first time she’s ever asked him that and he wrinkles his brow trying to process it.
</p>
<p>
“Why would I?”
</p>
<p>
“Please, David.”
</p>
<p>
“Of <em>course</em> not. Do you remember before we came here, when you were travelling all over the world and getting into trouble and I would come help you get out of it?”
</p>
<p>
“Oh my god, David, I was always fine.”
</p>
<p>
“You’re my sister, though. Of course I was going to go after you. And I don’t regret it.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, <em>now</em>.”
</p>
<p>
“No, listen,” he insists. She pushes her hair out of her face. “You having to go through this was only bearable because I could go through it with you. I mean, yes, now I have a husband and a home and as long as we’re lucky I’ll get to have them for at least fifty more years. Regardless of that, though, there’s no other choice I would make.”
</p>
<p>
“You <em>are</em> lucky.”
</p>
<p>
“I know.” He looks down at his rings and smiles helplessly. They remind him of Patrick’s eyes flickering in the light of the bonfire, promising the rest of his life.
</p>
<p>
“I will be okay, you know,” she says, tapping his knee.
</p>
<p>
“You’re going to be great,” he corrects, and feels her smile against his shoulder. “If I can’t be with you, I’m glad Stevie will be. And I am very proud of you.” They listen to the trees for a few minutes and David tries to hold off the shivers. “Can I see your Barcelona pictures?”
</p>
<p>
She perks up and pulls out her phone.
</p>
<p>
“Okay, so, we stayed at the cutest little place in Barceloneta, right by the beach,” she says, and pulls up a picture of an apartment building. “And the view, David! I’d forgotten what it was like to sleep with the ocean right there….”
</p>
<p>
Somewhere around two in the morning he nods off and she prods him awake with little hums and her cool hand on his face.
</p>
<p>
“Oh, hey, David,” Stevie says, poking her head through the open sliding door, blinking heavily. “Alexis? You coming back to bed?” 
</p>
<p>
“Mm, just a sec, babe,” Alexis says. Stevie smiles softly at her and leans against the door jamb to wait. “David.”
</p>
<p>
“Hm.”
</p>
<p>
“David, go to bed. You’ll get puffy and wrinkled.”
</p>
<p>
“Stop,” he says through a yawn. “Hey.” Alexis stops and turns. “I love you.”
</p>
<p>
She smiles. “Love you, too.”
</p>
<p>
He gets his glass of water and drinks it slowly over the sink, listening to the cadence of Alexis and Stevie’s quiet murmurs in the guest bedroom on the other side of the wall. He leaves the cup in the sink instead of putting it in the dishwasher, knowing that Patrick will let him hear about it in the morning, and makes his way back to their bedroom, his feet guiding him without the need of a light. As he climbs back into bed he tries his best not to wake up Patrick or the dog, who doesn’t even move from her cushion in the corner except for the twitching of her paws. 
</p>
<p>
“Y’okay?” Patrick mumbles, barely conscious, pulling David closer with an arm around his waist. 
</p>
<p>
“Everything’s fine,” he whispers, rubbing his cheek on Patrick’s soft warm sleep shirt, listening to his steady heart. “Go back to sleep.”
</p>
<p>
“Kay.” He noses at David’s hair. “Your hands are cold.”
</p>
<p>
“Sorry. I was sitting outside with Alexis.”
</p>
<p>
“Hm.”
</p>
<p>
“Were you dreaming of something nice?”
</p>
<p>
“Not ‘s nice as this.”
</p>
<p>
“Well, isn’t that sweet.”
</p>
<p>
Patrick breathes deeply in response and David smiles to himself and shifts closer to Patrick’s body heat, warmed.
</p>
<p>
In the corner Meggie stirs, flipping onto her back, looking like a haphazardly folded shag rug with paws. 
</p>
<p>
The house is quiet and dark around them, his family happy and whole under its roof; held in Patrick’s lovely arms, David whispers to himself, “And we live happily ever after.”
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I can't believe this is it! I have loved writing this and I want to thank you all so very much for sticking with me and for saying such nice things in the comments. Thank you!</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>You can reblog <a href="https://middyblue.tumblr.com/post/631960962091663360/the-immortals-of-schitts-creek-middyblue">here</a> and find me at <a href="http://middyblue.tumblr.com">middyblue</a> on tumblr!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>